Super Smash Bros. Ultimate

Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU): Difference between revisions

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Mr. Game & Watch is ranked 18th out of 82 on the ''Ultimate'' current [[tier list]], placing him in S- tier. This is a drastic improvement from his ranking in ''Smash 4'', where he was ranked 38th out of 54, and is his best placement in the series. Mr. Game & Watch's most notable strength is his unrivaled [[out of shield]] game. His [[up special]], [[Fire]], is the undisputed most effective and uncontested out-of-shield option in the game, as it possesses extremely quick startup with large hitboxes that are positioned on both sides of Mr. Game & Watch, allowing him to punish moves that are the slightest bit misspaced. It also functions as a combo starter due to the grounded version's high [[hitstun]], a combo breaker due to its [[intangibility]] on start-up, a KO and edgeguarding option due to the ascending hitbox's strong knockback, and an incredible [[recovery]] due to its considerable vertical distance, adjustable horizontal distance, and not sending Mr. Game & Watch into [[helpless]]ness, making it one of the best moves in the entire game. In addition, Mr. Game & Watch also possesses a strong combo that complements his high damage output as well as great KO potential thanks to the low lag on his [[smash attacks]], especially his [[up smash]] and [[down smash]]. Finally, his [[down special]], [[Oil Panic]], provides him with an excellent defense against characters with [[projectile]]-heavy playstyles due to it functioning as both a [[reflector]] and an [[absorption]]-based move, granting him an incredibly quick and powerful KO option depending on the projectiles absorbed.
Mr. Game & Watch is ranked 18th out of 82 on the ''Ultimate'' current [[tier list]], placing him in S- tier. This is a drastic improvement from his ranking in ''Smash 4'', where he was ranked 38th out of 54, and is his best placement in the series. Mr. Game & Watch's most notable strength is his unrivaled [[out of shield]] game. His [[up special]], [[Fire]], is the undisputed most effective and uncontested out-of-shield option in the game, as it possesses extremely quick startup with large hitboxes that are positioned on both sides of Mr. Game & Watch, allowing him to punish moves that are the slightest bit misspaced. It also functions as a combo starter due to the grounded version's high [[hitstun]], a combo breaker due to its [[intangibility]] on start-up, a KO and edgeguarding option due to the ascending hitbox's strong knockback, and an incredible [[recovery]] due to its considerable vertical distance, adjustable horizontal distance, and not sending Mr. Game & Watch into [[helpless]]ness, making it one of the best moves in the entire game. In addition, Mr. Game & Watch also possesses a strong combo that complements his high damage output as well as great KO potential thanks to the low lag on his [[smash attacks]], especially his [[up smash]] and [[down smash]]. Finally, his [[down special]], [[Oil Panic]], provides him with an excellent defense against characters with [[projectile]]-heavy playstyles due to it functioning as both a [[reflector]] and an [[absorption]]-based move, granting him an incredibly quick and powerful KO option depending on the projectiles absorbed.


However, Mr. Game & Watch possesses some notable weaknesses, the most significant of which is his extremely poor endurance. He is tied with {{SSBU|Squirtle}} for being the [[Weight|third-lightest]] character in the game, making him extremely easy to KO. This is further burdened with [[rage]], as opponents can take advantage of it against him to KO him eariler, while Mr. Game & Watch himself cannot endure long enough to benefit from his own rage at higher precents. Despite his strong out-of-shield game, his other defensive options are rather poor, with slow and short-reaching [[roll]]s and dodges. Although he has [[disjointed hitbox]]es in his attacks, his [[range]] is still rather lackluster, giving him notorious trouble against characters that can outrange him, especially swordfighters.
However, Mr. Game & Watch possesses some notable weaknesses, the most significant of which is his extremely poor endurance. He is tied with {{SSBU|Squirtle}} for being the [[Weight|third-lightest]] character in the game, making him extremely easy to KO. This is further burdened with [[rage]], as opponents can take advantage of it against him to KO him eariler, while Mr. Game & Watch himself cannot endure long enough to benefit from his own rage at higher precents. Despite his strong out-of-shield game, his other defensive options are rather poor, with slow and short-reaching [[roll]]s and dodges. Although he has [[disjointed hitbox]]es in his attacks, his [[range]] is still rather lackluster, giving him notorious trouble against characters that can outrange him, especially swordfighters. Additionally, some of his [[special move]]set can be conisidered situational depending on the matchup, with [[Judge]] requiring luck and [[Oil Panic]] being exclusively useful against characters with projectiles.


Overall, Mr. Game & Watch's strengths considerably outweigh his weaknesses, and he has achieved great success in competitive play due to the efforts of players such as {{Sm|Miya|p=Honshu}} and {{Sm|Maister}}.
Overall, Mr. Game & Watch's strengths considerably outweigh his weaknesses, and he has achieved great success in competitive play due to the efforts of players such as {{Sm|Miya|p=Honshu}} and {{Sm|Maister}}.
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==Attributes==
==Attributes==
Mr. Game & Watch is a character of extremes. While Mr. Game & Watch is a short [[weight|lightweight]], his attributes noticeably make him differ himself from the other characters of his weight class. He has fast [[air speed]] (the 18th-fastest), excellent [[air acceleration]] (the 13th-fastest), slightly above-average [[walk]]ing and average [[dash]]ing speeds (with a relatively quick [[initial dash]] as well) and high [[traction]] (tied with {{SSBU|Ness}}, {{SSBU|Villager}} and {{SSBU|Isabelle}} for the 5th-highest). However, his [[jump]]s are very low, his [[falling speed]] is slow (the 5th-slowest) and his [[gravity]] is below-average. Overall, Mr. Game & Watch's mobility is quite exceptional for a lightweight, though his slow falling speed, combined with his light weight, can be somewhat detrimental. In addition, he has among the lowest [[crouching|crouches]] in the game, allowing him to evade many attacks such as {{SSBU|Marth}}'s [[Shield Breaker]] and {{SSBU|Simon}}'s [[forward tilt]].
Mr. Game & Watch is a character of extremes. While Mr. Game & Watch is a short [[weight|lightweight]], his attributes noticeably make him differ himself from the other characters of his weight class. He has fast [[air speed]] (the 18th fastest), excellent [[air acceleration]] (the 13th fastest), slightly above-average [[walk]]ing and average [[dash]]ing speeds (with a relatively quick [[initial dash]] as well) and high [[traction]] (tied with {{SSBU|Ness}}, {{SSBU|Villager}} and {{SSBU|Isabelle}} for the 5th highest). However, his [[jump]]s are very low, his [[falling speed]] is slow (the 5th slowest) and his [[gravity]] is below-average. Overall, Mr. Game & Watch's mobility is quite exceptional for a lightweight, though his slow falling speed, combined with his light weight, can be somewhat detrimental. In addition, he has among the lowest [[crouching|crouches]] in the game, allowing him to evade many attacks such as {{SSBU|Marth}}'s [[Shield Breaker]] and {{SSBU|Simon}}'s [[forward tilt]].


Unlike most other lightweights, Mr. Game & Watch possesses attacks with large disjointed hitboxes and has numerous, powerful KO options. All of his [[smash attack]]s have very high power and low ending lag throughout, with each of them possessing unique attributes. [[Forward smash]] is among the strongest in the game if sweetspotted while having low endlag and good range, with the sweetspot being safe on shield. [[Up smash]] is also very strong, and comes with full body invincibility while the hitboxes are active. While it has slow startup, it has minimal endlag and is completely safe on shield. [[Down smash]] sends opponents at an awkward [[semi-spike]] angle offstage, while its sweetspot [[bury|buries]] opponents long enough to lead into a forward smash, even at medium percents. It also has a very large hitbox, allowing it to easily 2-frame many recoveries, and acts as an excellent punish option on rolls. Like his other smash attacks, down smash is safe on shield when spaced properly. Overall, Mr. Game & Watch possesses an excellent arsenal of smash attacks.
Unlike most other lightweights, Mr. Game & Watch possesses attacks with large disjointed hitboxes and has a numerous amount of powerful KO options. All of his [[smash attack]]s have excellent power and low ending lag throughout, with each of them possessing unique attributes. [[Forward smash]] is among the strongest in the game if sweetspotted while possessing low ending lag and good range, with the sweetspot being safe on shield. [[Up smash]] also boasts comparatively high power, and comes with full-body [[invincibility]] while the hitboxes are active. While it has slow startup, it has minimal ending lag and is completely safe on shield. [[Down smash]] sends opponents at an awkward [[semi-spike]] angle offstage, while its sweetspot [[bury|buries]] opponents long enough to lead into a forward smash, even at medium percents. It also has a very large hitbox, allowing it to easily 2-frame several recoveries, and acts as an excellent punishing option on rolls. Like his other smash attacks, down smash is safe on shield when spaced properly. Overall, Mr. Game & Watch possesses an excellent arsenal of smash attacks.


Outside of his smash attacks, Mr. Game & Watch's other moves also boast strong KO potential. [[Forward tilt]] comes out quickly, has a lingering hitbox, and kills under 120% by the ledge, sending characters at a semi-spike. [[Down tilt]] lowers Mr. Game & Watch's hurtbox to match his crouch, allowing him to whiff-punish certain attacks. It also possesses high power and semi-spikes opponents offstage, leading to [[edgeguard]]s and killing outright at 100%. His new [[forward aerial]]'s explosion kills opponents at 120% by the ledge, while his [[back aerial]] now sends at a flatter angle with enough power to KO below 100% offstage. The clean hit on down aerial boasts a powerful meteor smash that can KO below 40%, while the late hit deals enough knockback to KO under 130%, and even sooner if it connects near the top blast zone, courtesy of the move's vertical launch angle. The move's low ending lag allows as to be used as a potent edgeguarding and landing option, giving him a deadly mixup game in the air at all times.
Outside of his smash attacks, Mr. Game & Watch's other moves also boast strong KO potential. [[Forward tilt]] comes out quickly, has a lingering hitbox, and kills under 120% by the ledge, sending characters at a semi-spike. [[Down tilt]] lowers Mr. Game & Watch's hurtbox to match his crouch, allowing him to whiff-punish certain attacks. It also possesses high power and semi-spikes opponents offstage, leading to [[edgeguard]]s and killing outright at 100%. His new [[forward aerial]]'s explosion kills middleweights at 120% by the ledge, while his [[back aerial]] now sends at a flatter angle with enough power to KO below 100% offstage. The clean hit on [[down aerial]] boasts a powerful [[meteor smash]] that can KO below 40%, while the late hit deals enough knockback to KO under 130%, and even sooner if it connects near the top blast zone, courtesy of the move's vertical launching angle. The move's low ending lag allows it to be useful as a potent edgeguarding and landing option, giving him a deadly mixup game in the air at all times.


Oil Panic is used as Mr. Game & Watch's primary defense against camping and projectiles, as it both absorbs energy projectiles from moves such as Mega Buster and [[PK Fire]], and reflects items like {{SSBU|King K. Rool}}'s [[Blunderbuss]] and {{SSBU|Peach}}'s [[Turnip]]s. This can lead to massive advantages against certain characters who rely on projectiles in their playstyle. Oil Panic also has the notable ability of carrying over the charge to subsequent stocks, which can be used as a lethal finisher and even mind games. The area in which Oil Panic can absorb projectiles is also deceptively large, which allows Mr. Game & Watch to store energy into Oil Panic merely by standing close to just the edge of any energy projectile. Finally, Oil Panic is also a potent combo finisher with nearly instantaneous startup lag, with its fairly large, lingering hitbox coming out on just frame 2, as well as extreme knockback that can kill at single digit percents when at max power (power is dependent on projectiles absorbed). It is also notably difficult to defend against a fully charged use of it, as the lingering hitbox can still hit spot dodges if timed even slightly off, and a powerful enough charge can break a full shield, allowing Mr. Game & Watch to punish with one of his powerful smash attacks. However, Oil Panic has the glaring weakness of being filled with extremely weak moves such as Fox's blaster. This causes Mr. Game & Watch to fill Oil Panic extremely quickly, rendering its defensive value useless, and forces him to either hold onto a weak use of it, or dump it without purposefully damaging the opponent in order to use it again as a defensive tool. In addition, a full Oil Panic cannot absorb or reflect any projectiles, making Mr. Game & Watch more vulnerable to projectiles unless he releases the oil spill.
[[Oil Panic]] is versatile as Mr. Game & Watch's primary defense against [[camping]] and [[projectile]]s, as it both absorbs energy-based projectiles from attacks (such as Mega Buster and [[PK Fire]]), and reflects items and/or physical projectiles (like {{SSBU|King K. Rool}}'s [[Blunderbuss]] and {{SSBU|Peach}}'s [[Turnip]]s). This can lead to massive advantages against certain characters who rely on projectiles in their playstyles—{{SSBU|Ness}}, {{SSBU|Snake}}, {{SSBU|Olimar}}, {{SSBU|Mega Man}}, and {{SSBU|Pikachu}} especially have notable difficulty fighting Mr. Game & Watch as it drastically limits their playstyles and movesets. Oil Panic also has the notable ability of carrying over the charge to subsequent stocks, which can be used as a lethal finisher and even mindgames. The area in which Oil Panic can absorb projectiles is also deceptively large, which allows Mr. Game & Watch to store energy into Oil Panic merely by standing close to just the edge of any energy-based projectile. Finally, Oil Panic is also a potent combo finisher with nearly instantaneous startup lag, with its fairly large, lingering hitbox coming out on just frame 2, as well as extreme knockback that can kill at single-digit percents when at maximum power (power is dependent on projectiles absorbed). It is also notably difficult to defend against a fully charged use of it, as the lingering hitbox can still hit spot dodges if timed even slightly off, and a powerful enough charge can break a full shield, allowing Mr. Game & Watch to punish with one of his powerful smash attacks. However, Oil Panic has the glaring weakness of being filled with extremely weak moves, such as {{SSBU|Fox}}'s blaster. This causes Mr. Game & Watch to fill Oil Panic extremely quickly, rendering its defensive value useless, and forces him to either hold onto a weak use of it, or dump it without purposefully damaging the opponent in order to use it again as a defensive tool. In addition, a full Oil Panic cannot absorb or reflect any projectiles, making Mr. Game & Watch more vulnerable to projectiles unless he releases the oil spill.


Mr. Game & Watch also has a very potent combo and aerial juggling game. Down throw combos into Oil Panic, [[Judge]], and [[neutral air]] at low percentages. [[Chef]] can deal massive damage if multiple 'food' items hit, allowing it to get around 30-40% off of a single edgeguard. The pan also hits opponents into the stream of meat through a [[semi-spike]], and at high percents can launch opponents fast enough to miss the food entirely and lead to more ledge trapping. Chef's speed and pattern makes it extremely difficult for certain characters to recover, such as {{SSBU|Ganondorf}} or {{SSBU|Mario}}. Not only does Chef deal massive damage, but landing the move allows Mr. Game & Watch to follow up with a grab, neutral aerial, forward tilt, dash attack, and even Judge. Up tilt, though having worse range, deals high damage and combos into neutral aerial and Judge at low percentages. Once Mr. Game & Watch has his opponents above him, he can juggle them for massive damage using his up and neutral aerials. His up air acts similar to Mega Man's up air, pushing opponents upwards, albeit with much less force. All in all, Mr. Game & Watch's strong KO power is also paired with highly damaging combos and juggles.
Mr. Game & Watch also has a very potent combo and aerial juggling game. Down throw combos into Oil Panic, [[Judge]], and [[neutral air]] at low percentages. [[Chef]] can deal massive damage if multiple "food" projectile hit, allowing it to inflict up to 30-40% off of a single edgeguard. The pan also hits opponents into the stream of meat through a [[semi-spike]], and at high percents can launch opponents fast enough to miss the food entirely and lead to more ledge-trapping. Chef's speed and pattern makes it extremely difficult for certain characters to recover, such as {{SSBU|Ganondorf}} or {{SSBU|Mario}}. Not only does Chef deal massive damage, but landing the move allows Mr. Game & Watch to follow up with a grab, neutral aerial, forward tilt, dash attack, and even Judge. Up tilt, though having worse range, deals high damage and combos into neutral aerial and Judge at low percentages. Once Mr. Game & Watch has his opponents above him, he can juggle them for massive damage using his up and neutral aerials. His up air functions similar to Mega Man's up air, pushing opponents upwards, albeit with much less force. All in all, Mr. Game & Watch's strong KO power is also paired with damaging combos and juggles.


Lastly, Mr. Game & Watch possesses a fantastic recovery option, as well as large, long-lasting and disjointed aerials. This means that he is a formidable edgeguarder and is extremely hard to gimp himself. His [[up special]], [[Fire]], has frame 3 startup, invincibility in its early frames, impressive recovery distance vertically and horizontally, and a strong upwards hitbox on its initial hitbox, with decent launch power horizontally, allowing for early off-stage KOs if it hits opposite the blast zone. This makes it deadly, as it can [[stage spike]] unwary opponents while also easily gimping characters with poor recoveries, like {{SSBU|Chrom}}. It is also an extremely useful combo breaker and the game's uncontested best [[out of shield|out-of-shield]] option due to its fast startup and invincibility, which is further complemented by it not rendering him [[helpless]]. His [[back aerial]], Turtle Bridge, is a large, long-lasting disjointed multi-hit move that has high knockback at the final hit. The move's large disjoint beats out a lot of recoveries that have hitboxes, and the multi-hit nature of the move makes it hard to tech for stage-spikes and often drags opponents stuck in the move closer to the blast zone. For many characters, getting hit with Turtle Bridge is often fatal off-stage, as the move lingers long enough to shift the opponent closer to the blast zone before dealing the final knockback on the last hit. On the ledge, Chef punishes ledge hangers and covers getup attack and rolls (hit by the pan), forcing opponents to jump. This can easily allow Mr. Game & Watch to follow up with neutral aerial and force the opponent back off-stage. His new forward aerial can be comboed into with Chef and has strong KO potential on its own. Lastly, his up air has the notable quality of having no set limit on its distance, making it arguably the best juggling option in the game. Overall, Mr. Game & Watch is extremely deadly off the stage and at the ledge to all characters, even including himself.
Lastly, Mr. Game & Watch possesses a fantastic [[recovering]] option, as well as large, long-lasting and disjointed aerials. This means that he is a formidable edgeguarder while being extremely hard to [[gimp]] himself. His [[up special]], [[Fire]], has frame-3 startup, invincibility in its early frames, impressive recovering distance vertically and horizontally, and a strong upwards hitbox on its initial hitbox, with decent launch power horizontally, allowing for early off-stage KOs if it hits opposite the blast zone. This makes it deadly, as it can [[stage spike]] unwary opponents while also easily gimping characters with poor recoveries, like {{SSBU|Chrom}}. It is also an extremely useful combo breaker and the game's uncontested best [[out of shield|out-of-shield]] option due to its fast startup and invincibility, which is further complemented by it not rendering him [[helpless]]. His [[back aerial]], Turtle Bridge, is a large, long-lasting disjointed multi-hitting move that deals high knockback at the final hit. The move's large disjoint beats out a lot of recoveries that have hitboxes, and the multi-hitting nature of the move makes it hard to tech for [[stage spike]]s and often drags opponents stuck in the move closer to the blast zone. For most characters, getting hit with Turtle Bridge is often fatal off-stage, as the move lingers long enough to shift the opponent closer to the blast zone before dealing the final knockback on the last hit. On the ledge, Chef punishes ledge-hangers and covers getup attacks and rolls (hit by the pan), forcing opponents to jump. This can easily allow Mr. Game & Watch to follow up with neutral aerial and force the opponent back off-stage. His new forward aerial can be comboed into with Chef and has strong KO potential on its own. Lastly, his up air has the notable quality of having no set limit on its distance, making it arguably the best juggling option in the game. Overall, Mr. Game & Watch is extremely deadly off the stage and at the ledge to all characters, even including himself.


Despite these strengths, Mr. Game & Watch possesses a few notable weaknesses. He is tied with {{SSBU|Squirtle}} being the [[weight|third-lightest]] character in the game, which, along with his floatiness, make his horizontal and vertical endurance terrible. [[Rage]] is an additional burden, since opponents can send him flying even earlier with high levels of it, while Mr. Game & Watch himself cannot endure long enough to benefit from his own rage. In addition, despite having surprisingly good [[range]] for his size due to his disjointed hitboxes, his overall range is mediocre. This is worsened by the fact that many of his disjointed moves like down tilt, up tilt, and forward smash have underwhelming range for a disjoint. As a result, swordfighters like {{SSBU|Marth}} and {{SSBU|Cloud}} are able to easily keep Mr. Game & Watch at arm's length and stop his approaches. While his new forward air possesses more damage and knockback, it has very low priority, so any move can hit the bomb and make it disappear. This makes it unsuitable for approaching and forces Mr. Game & Watch to approach with his back air instead. It is also a much more situational move in general, due to its higher lag and delayed hitbox, as the bomb will only explode upon touching the ground or waiting for half a second. Additionally, none of his aerials can [[auto-cancel]] in a short hop and Mr. Game & Watch lacks other effective out of shield options outside of Fire. Due to this, he has a somewhat lackluster neutral game and a rather poor approach. His [[grab]] game is also situational outside of comboing: while Mr. Game & Watch's [[down throw]] and [[up throw]] are good at starting combos, his [[forward throw]] and [[back throw]] leave a lot to be desired due to being purely positional throws, and none of Mr. Game & Watch's [[throws]] can KO until very high percents, with his strongest throw, down throw, KOing at around 200%. He also has poor defensive capabilities, possessing slow and short-reaching [[spot dodge]]s and [[roll]]s, as well as some of the slowest [[air dodge]]s in the game.
Despite these strengths, Mr. Game & Watch possesses a few notable weaknesses. He is tied with {{SSBU|Squirtle}} being the [[weight|third-lightest]] character in the game, which, along with his floatiness, make his horizontal and vertical endurance terrible. [[Rage]] is an additional burden, since opponents can send him flying even earlier with high levels of it, while Mr. Game & Watch himself cannot endure long enough to benefit from his own rage. In addition, despite having surprisingly good [[range]] for his size due to his disjointed hitboxes, his overall range is mediocre. This is worsened by the fact that several of his disjointed moves like down tilt, up tilt, and forward smash have underwhelming range for a disjoint. As a result, swordfighters like {{SSBU|Marth}} and {{SSBU|Cloud}} are able to easily keep Mr. Game & Watch at arm's length and stop his approaches. While his new forward air possesses more damage and knockback, it has very low priority, so any move can hit the bomb and make it disappear. This makes it unsuitable for approaching and forces Mr. Game & Watch to approach with his back air instead. It is also a much more situational move in general, due to its higher lag and delayed hitbox, as the bomb will only explode upon touching the ground or waiting for half a second. Additionally, none of his aerials can [[auto-cancel]] in a short hop and Mr. Game & Watch lacks other effective out of shield options outside of Fire. Due to this, he has a somewhat lackluster neutral game and a rather poor approach. His [[grab]] game is also situational outside of comboing: while Mr. Game & Watch's [[down throw]] and [[up throw]] are good at starting combos, his [[forward throw]] and [[back throw]] leave a lot to be desired due to being purely positional throws, and none of Mr. Game & Watch's [[throws]] can KO until very high percents, with his strongest throw, down throw, KOing at around 200%. He also has poor defensive capabilities, possessing slow and short-reaching [[spot dodge]]s and [[roll]]s, as well as some of the slowest [[air dodge]]s in the game. Finally, some of his special moves are considered to be situational depending on the matchup, with [[Judge]] being polarizing and unsafe in general due to its randomness and requiring luck, and [[Oil Panic]] being useless against melee-oriented characters as it is exculsively useful against characters with projectiles.


All in all, Mr. Game & Watch is a very powerful glass cannon with unique properties to a majority of his moves, and is universally believed to be among the most potent glass cannons in the game. He possesses extremely high damage output and powerful KOing ability while being very vulnerable himself, but is compensated for his extremely poor endurance, mediocre approach and low defensive capabilities with an incredible recovery, a brutal combo and juggling game, great edgeguarding, oppressive off-stage presence, and explosive power through most of his moveset, especially his smash attacks and Oil Panic. Overall, his strengths considerably outweigh his weaknesses, making Mr. Game & Watch one of the most fragile characters, but also among the most oppressive in all of ''Ultimate''.
All in all, Mr. Game & Watch is a very powerful glass cannon with unique properties to a majority of his moveset, and is universally believed to be among the most potent glass cannons in the game. He possesses extremely high damage output and powerful KOing ability while being very vulnerable himself, but is compensated for his extremely poor endurance, mediocre approach and low defensive capabilities with an incredible recovery, a brutal combo and juggling game, great edgeguarding, oppressive offstage presence, and explosive power through most of his moveset, especially his smash attacks and Oil Panic. Overall, his strengths considerably outweigh his weaknesses, making Mr. Game & Watch one of the most fragile characters, but also among the most oppressive in all of ''Ultimate''.


==Changes from ''[[Super Smash Bros. 4]]''==
==Changes from ''[[Super Smash Bros. 4]]''==

Revision as of 15:20, January 28, 2024

This article is about Mr. Game & Watch's appearance in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. For the character in other contexts, see Mr. Game & Watch.
Mr. Game & Watch
in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate
Mr. Game & Watch SSBU.png
Game&WatchSymbol.svg
Universe Game & Watch
Other playable appearances in Melee
in Brawl
in SSB4
Availability Unlockable
Final Smash Octopus
Tier S- (18)
Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)

Mr. Game & Watch (Mr.ゲーム＆ウォッチ, Mr. Game & Watch) is a playable character in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. He was confirmed alongside Greninja and the rest of the returning roster on June 12th, 2018 during E3 2018. Mr. Game & Watch is classified as Fighter #26, the last fighter number of the Super Smash Bros. Melee veterans.

As in his Super Smash Bros. 4 incarnation, Mr. Game & Watch reuses his sound effects from Melee and Super Smash Bros. Brawl for Ultimate.

Mr. Game & Watch is ranked 18th out of 82 on the Ultimate current tier list, placing him in S- tier. This is a drastic improvement from his ranking in Smash 4, where he was ranked 38th out of 54, and is his best placement in the series. Mr. Game & Watch's most notable strength is his unrivaled out of shield game. His up special, Fire, is the undisputed most effective and uncontested out-of-shield option in the game, as it possesses extremely quick startup with large hitboxes that are positioned on both sides of Mr. Game & Watch, allowing him to punish moves that are the slightest bit misspaced. It also functions as a combo starter due to the grounded version's high hitstun, a combo breaker due to its intangibility on start-up, a KO and edgeguarding option due to the ascending hitbox's strong knockback, and an incredible recovery due to its considerable vertical distance, adjustable horizontal distance, and not sending Mr. Game & Watch into helplessness, making it one of the best moves in the entire game. In addition, Mr. Game & Watch also possesses a strong combo that complements his high damage output as well as great KO potential thanks to the low lag on his smash attacks, especially his up smash and down smash. Finally, his down special, Oil Panic, provides him with an excellent defense against characters with projectile-heavy playstyles due to it functioning as both a reflector and an absorption-based move, granting him an incredibly quick and powerful KO option depending on the projectiles absorbed.

However, Mr. Game & Watch possesses some notable weaknesses, the most significant of which is his extremely poor endurance. He is tied with Squirtle for being the third-lightest character in the game, making him extremely easy to KO. This is further burdened with rage, as opponents can take advantage of it against him to KO him eariler, while Mr. Game & Watch himself cannot endure long enough to benefit from his own rage at higher precents. Despite his strong out-of-shield game, his other defensive options are rather poor, with slow and short-reaching rolls and dodges. Although he has disjointed hitboxes in his attacks, his range is still rather lackluster, giving him notorious trouble against characters that can outrange him, especially swordfighters. Additionally, some of his special moveset can be conisidered situational depending on the matchup, with Judge requiring luck and Oil Panic being exclusively useful against characters with projectiles.

Overall, Mr. Game & Watch's strengths considerably outweigh his weaknesses, and he has achieved great success in competitive play due to the efforts of players such as Miya and Maister.

How to unlock

Complete one of the following:

  • Play VS. matches, with Mr. Game & Watch being the 52nd character to be unlocked.
  • Clear Classic Mode with Pikachu or any character in its unlock tree, being the 6th character unlocked after Isabelle.
  • Have Mr. Game & Watch join the player's party in World of Light.

Mr. Game & Watch must then be defeated on Flat Zone X (the Ω form is used in World of Light).

Attributes

Mr. Game & Watch is a character of extremes. While Mr. Game & Watch is a short lightweight, his attributes noticeably make him differ himself from the other characters of his weight class. He has fast air speed (the 18th fastest), excellent air acceleration (the 13th fastest), slightly above-average walking and average dashing speeds (with a relatively quick initial dash as well) and high traction (tied with Ness, Villager and Isabelle for the 5th highest). However, his jumps are very low, his falling speed is slow (the 5th slowest) and his gravity is below-average. Overall, Mr. Game & Watch's mobility is quite exceptional for a lightweight, though his slow falling speed, combined with his light weight, can be somewhat detrimental. In addition, he has among the lowest crouches in the game, allowing him to evade many attacks such as Marth's Shield Breaker and Simon's forward tilt.

Unlike most other lightweights, Mr. Game & Watch possesses attacks with large disjointed hitboxes and has a numerous amount of powerful KO options. All of his smash attacks have excellent power and low ending lag throughout, with each of them possessing unique attributes. Forward smash is among the strongest in the game if sweetspotted while possessing low ending lag and good range, with the sweetspot being safe on shield. Up smash also boasts comparatively high power, and comes with full-body invincibility while the hitboxes are active. While it has slow startup, it has minimal ending lag and is completely safe on shield. Down smash sends opponents at an awkward semi-spike angle offstage, while its sweetspot buries opponents long enough to lead into a forward smash, even at medium percents. It also has a very large hitbox, allowing it to easily 2-frame several recoveries, and acts as an excellent punishing option on rolls. Like his other smash attacks, down smash is safe on shield when spaced properly. Overall, Mr. Game & Watch possesses an excellent arsenal of smash attacks.

Outside of his smash attacks, Mr. Game & Watch's other moves also boast strong KO potential. Forward tilt comes out quickly, has a lingering hitbox, and kills under 120% by the ledge, sending characters at a semi-spike. Down tilt lowers Mr. Game & Watch's hurtbox to match his crouch, allowing him to whiff-punish certain attacks. It also possesses high power and semi-spikes opponents offstage, leading to edgeguards and killing outright at 100%. His new forward aerial's explosion kills middleweights at 120% by the ledge, while his back aerial now sends at a flatter angle with enough power to KO below 100% offstage. The clean hit on down aerial boasts a powerful meteor smash that can KO below 40%, while the late hit deals enough knockback to KO under 130%, and even sooner if it connects near the top blast zone, courtesy of the move's vertical launching angle. The move's low ending lag allows it to be useful as a potent edgeguarding and landing option, giving him a deadly mixup game in the air at all times.

Oil Panic is versatile as Mr. Game & Watch's primary defense against camping and projectiles, as it both absorbs energy-based projectiles from attacks (such as Mega Buster and PK Fire), and reflects items and/or physical projectiles (like King K. Rool's Blunderbuss and Peach's Turnips). This can lead to massive advantages against certain characters who rely on projectiles in their playstyles—Ness, Snake, Olimar, Mega Man, and Pikachu especially have notable difficulty fighting Mr. Game & Watch as it drastically limits their playstyles and movesets. Oil Panic also has the notable ability of carrying over the charge to subsequent stocks, which can be used as a lethal finisher and even mindgames. The area in which Oil Panic can absorb projectiles is also deceptively large, which allows Mr. Game & Watch to store energy into Oil Panic merely by standing close to just the edge of any energy-based projectile. Finally, Oil Panic is also a potent combo finisher with nearly instantaneous startup lag, with its fairly large, lingering hitbox coming out on just frame 2, as well as extreme knockback that can kill at single-digit percents when at maximum power (power is dependent on projectiles absorbed). It is also notably difficult to defend against a fully charged use of it, as the lingering hitbox can still hit spot dodges if timed even slightly off, and a powerful enough charge can break a full shield, allowing Mr. Game & Watch to punish with one of his powerful smash attacks. However, Oil Panic has the glaring weakness of being filled with extremely weak moves, such as Fox's blaster. This causes Mr. Game & Watch to fill Oil Panic extremely quickly, rendering its defensive value useless, and forces him to either hold onto a weak use of it, or dump it without purposefully damaging the opponent in order to use it again as a defensive tool. In addition, a full Oil Panic cannot absorb or reflect any projectiles, making Mr. Game & Watch more vulnerable to projectiles unless he releases the oil spill.

Mr. Game & Watch also has a very potent combo and aerial juggling game. Down throw combos into Oil Panic, Judge, and neutral air at low percentages. Chef can deal massive damage if multiple "food" projectile hit, allowing it to inflict up to 30-40% off of a single edgeguard. The pan also hits opponents into the stream of meat through a semi-spike, and at high percents can launch opponents fast enough to miss the food entirely and lead to more ledge-trapping. Chef's speed and pattern makes it extremely difficult for certain characters to recover, such as Ganondorf or Mario. Not only does Chef deal massive damage, but landing the move allows Mr. Game & Watch to follow up with a grab, neutral aerial, forward tilt, dash attack, and even Judge. Up tilt, though having worse range, deals high damage and combos into neutral aerial and Judge at low percentages. Once Mr. Game & Watch has his opponents above him, he can juggle them for massive damage using his up and neutral aerials. His up air functions similar to Mega Man's up air, pushing opponents upwards, albeit with much less force. All in all, Mr. Game & Watch's strong KO power is also paired with damaging combos and juggles.

Lastly, Mr. Game & Watch possesses a fantastic recovering option, as well as large, long-lasting and disjointed aerials. This means that he is a formidable edgeguarder while being extremely hard to gimp himself. His up special, Fire, has frame-3 startup, invincibility in its early frames, impressive recovering distance vertically and horizontally, and a strong upwards hitbox on its initial hitbox, with decent launch power horizontally, allowing for early off-stage KOs if it hits opposite the blast zone. This makes it deadly, as it can stage spike unwary opponents while also easily gimping characters with poor recoveries, like Chrom. It is also an extremely useful combo breaker and the game's uncontested best out-of-shield option due to its fast startup and invincibility, which is further complemented by it not rendering him helpless. His back aerial, Turtle Bridge, is a large, long-lasting disjointed multi-hitting move that deals high knockback at the final hit. The move's large disjoint beats out a lot of recoveries that have hitboxes, and the multi-hitting nature of the move makes it hard to tech for stage spikes and often drags opponents stuck in the move closer to the blast zone. For most characters, getting hit with Turtle Bridge is often fatal off-stage, as the move lingers long enough to shift the opponent closer to the blast zone before dealing the final knockback on the last hit. On the ledge, Chef punishes ledge-hangers and covers getup attacks and rolls (hit by the pan), forcing opponents to jump. This can easily allow Mr. Game & Watch to follow up with neutral aerial and force the opponent back off-stage. His new forward aerial can be comboed into with Chef and has strong KO potential on its own. Lastly, his up air has the notable quality of having no set limit on its distance, making it arguably the best juggling option in the game. Overall, Mr. Game & Watch is extremely deadly off the stage and at the ledge to all characters, even including himself.

Despite these strengths, Mr. Game & Watch possesses a few notable weaknesses. He is tied with Squirtle being the third-lightest character in the game, which, along with his floatiness, make his horizontal and vertical endurance terrible. Rage is an additional burden, since opponents can send him flying even earlier with high levels of it, while Mr. Game & Watch himself cannot endure long enough to benefit from his own rage. In addition, despite having surprisingly good range for his size due to his disjointed hitboxes, his overall range is mediocre. This is worsened by the fact that several of his disjointed moves like down tilt, up tilt, and forward smash have underwhelming range for a disjoint. As a result, swordfighters like Marth and Cloud are able to easily keep Mr. Game & Watch at arm's length and stop his approaches. While his new forward air possesses more damage and knockback, it has very low priority, so any move can hit the bomb and make it disappear. This makes it unsuitable for approaching and forces Mr. Game & Watch to approach with his back air instead. It is also a much more situational move in general, due to its higher lag and delayed hitbox, as the bomb will only explode upon touching the ground or waiting for half a second. Additionally, none of his aerials can auto-cancel in a short hop and Mr. Game & Watch lacks other effective out of shield options outside of Fire. Due to this, he has a somewhat lackluster neutral game and a rather poor approach. His grab game is also situational outside of comboing: while Mr. Game & Watch's down throw and up throw are good at starting combos, his forward throw and back throw leave a lot to be desired due to being purely positional throws, and none of Mr. Game & Watch's throws can KO until very high percents, with his strongest throw, down throw, KOing at around 200%. He also has poor defensive capabilities, possessing slow and short-reaching spot dodges and rolls, as well as some of the slowest air dodges in the game. Finally, some of his special moves are considered to be situational depending on the matchup, with Judge being polarizing and unsafe in general due to its randomness and requiring luck, and Oil Panic being useless against melee-oriented characters as it is exculsively useful against characters with projectiles.

All in all, Mr. Game & Watch is a very powerful glass cannon with unique properties to a majority of his moveset, and is universally believed to be among the most potent glass cannons in the game. He possesses extremely high damage output and powerful KOing ability while being very vulnerable himself, but is compensated for his extremely poor endurance, mediocre approach and low defensive capabilities with an incredible recovery, a brutal combo and juggling game, great edgeguarding, oppressive offstage presence, and explosive power through most of his moveset, especially his smash attacks and Oil Panic. Overall, his strengths considerably outweigh his weaknesses, making Mr. Game & Watch one of the most fragile characters, but also among the most oppressive in all of Ultimate.

Changes from Super Smash Bros. 4

Mr. Game & Watch has some of the most noticeable changes of any veteran in the transition to Ultimate, as several of his animations have been altered to change his appearance to the games they originate from when he performs them. This has led to a massive overhaul in his moveset that goes beyond changes to aesthetic appearances, as many of these moves have been mechanically altered and, in some cases, completely reworked altogether in their purpose and utility. As a result, Mr. Game & Watch has undergone a large mix of buffs and nerfs in his transition to Ultimate, arguably the most out of any other returning veteran; however, while these changes have weakened a few of his most powerful tools and set-ups from SSB4, they have also greatly improved several of his more underwhelming moves in his toolkit from the previous game, and the changes to game mechanics have benefitted these changes as well. As a result, Mr. Game & Watch has been significantly buffed overall.

Mr. Game & Watch's KO and edgeguarding potential have been drastically improved, since a majority of his regular moves, including forward and down tilts, all of his smash attacks, and back and down aerials, have much stronger knockback; this drastically tones down one of his main weaknesses from SSB4. His smash attacks have also improved beyond higher power — down smash now has faster startup and can now bury grounded opponents when sweetspotted, allowing it to lead into followups and KO confirms, and its long range and burying time make it the best move of its kind. Forward smash is even easier to sweetspot than in SSB4, while up smash has faster startup with increased duration and now renders Mr. Game & Watch himself completely invincible during the attack, as opposed to just his head and foot.

His attacks have also increased utility overall. Changes to neutral aerial's first hits allow them to link together more reliably and catch opponents above him more effectively, and the move's reduced landing lag means it can now be used as a landing option and set-up tool (notably having a KO confirm into down tilt at high percentages), while retaining its decently strong knockback, allowing it to be used as an emergency KO option. Forward tilt has a much longer duration, making it an effective option for both 2-framing and spotdodging, and up tilt's hits connect into each other much more reliably, improving its consistency. Chef's trajectory can now be controlled, which makes it much easier to catch opponents who are trying to reach for the ledge and is now more effective keeping control of the neutral game. Oil Panic can now reflect physical projectiles in addition to absorbing energy-based projectiles (though it doesn't increase their power), and Judge's numbers 5, 7, 8, and 9 have improved. Mr. Game & Watch now sports a much more disjointed dash and pivot grab, giving it effective reach. However, his up special, Fire, has seen the most improvements; it now has a frame 3 hitbox that replaces its windbox from SSB4, which launches opponent directly upwards, and can even be comboed up with a neutral or up aerial at low percentages to keep juggling opponents. Because of this, it is now infamously considered both the best up special and the best out of shield option in the entire game.

Mr. Game & Watch has gained two new attacks in his forward and up aerials. Forward aerial now has Mr. Game & Watch drop a bomb in front of him; compared to his old forward aerial, it posseses stronger knockback and damage output, as well as much more versatility, as its explosion can cover the entire ledge of a stage, it can be used as a combo starter at low percentages, as a shield pressuring tool, and a landing option (as it is much safer on block). Meanwhile, his up aerial now has Mr. Game & Watch shoot a single puff of air upwards as a projectile, functioning very similarly to Mega Man's up aerial; this projectile has much more vertical range than his old up air, and is more reliable for keeping opponents trapped in it. It, combined with his neutral aerial, now gives Mr. Game & Watch more respectable juggling potential.

However, Mr. Game & Watch has also received a few notable nerfs, most notably to his two most potent strengths from SSB4 — his up smash and down throw setups. Down throw now deals much more knockback, removing its follow-up potential at higher percents. Despite the startup reduction, extended hitbox duration and increased knockback to up smash, it has lost all of its invincibility frames during the move's startup, making it much less effective as an anti-air, and allows opponents to challenge it easier.

Many of Mr. Game & Watch's new animations have resulted in hitbox reductions for several of his attacks, including forward tilt, up aerial, up tilt, and most notably, his down tilt, the latter of which is now incapable of hitting aerial opponents altogether. This tones down Mr. Game & Watch's deceptive reach, and requires him to be closer towards opponents more often than before. Judge #9's effectiveness has also been halved, since instead of not having SDI at all, it now has a double SDI multiplier, and when combined with the hit's high hitlag, makes it much easier to prepare for and reduces its effectiveness for early KOs. His new moves have also come with drawbacks; while his new forward aerial possesses more utility than his old one, it has much weaker priority to the point that the bomb disappears if it gets hit and the hitbox does not completely cover it, making it a riskier option to challenge opponents in the air with. His new up aerial has also lost all of its KO power, which, compounded with the changes to his down throw, effectively removes his "Toot Toot" KO confirm from SSB4.

The changes to gameplay-based mechanics both strengthen and impair Mr. Game & Watch. The ability to run cancel also improves the newfound utility of his grounded attacks further, and now gives him access very quick KO options he previously didn't have access to. He also possesses a much higher traction, which combined with the improvements to Fire gives him a much stronger out of shield game, which was a weakness he suffered from in SSB4. However, while the universal increase in mobility benefits his own mobility, several other veterans now boast overall faster mobility to varying degrees as well, making it hard for him to keep up with them. The changes to air dodging mechanics and reintroduction of directional air dodging give Mr. Game & Watch an option to either extend his recovery in a pinch, or use one as a short-ranged recovery without the necessity to use his up special, but this has also resulted in his air dodges becoming some of the slowest in the game, making them susceptible to punishment. The weakening of rage improves Mr. Game & Watch's endurance, but due to his surprisingly good survivability for a lightweight, this also weakens his ability to use it to his advantage, due to his plentiful strong attacks such as Judge 9. Finally, despite his numerous improvements, Mr. Game & Watch retains some of the same issues from SSB4, namely his poor endurance, short reach, poor defense, and a lack of reliable approaching options.

Overall, Mr. Game & Watch generally retains much of his bait-and-punish playstyle from SSB4, though the adjustments and increased utility he received to several of his attacks, as well as his significantly improved KO power, have led him to become more of an "all-rounder" type of character to his fellow lightweight brethren. This has garnered Mr. Game & Watch a strikingly positive reception overall, and this incarnation of Mr. Game & Watch is near universally considered to be his best iteration in the series yet.

Aesthetics

  • Change Mr. Game & Watch's appearance is largely unchanged from SSB4, though his outline is thicker and a darker gray and his feet are slightly larger.
  • Change The following moves temporarily alter Mr. Game & Watch's appearance to resemble the characters from the Game & Watch games they are based on:
    • Neutral attack (Greenhouse), forward tilt (Lion), up tilt (Flagman), down tilt (Manhole), forward smash (Fire Attack), down smash (Vermin), up aerial (Spitball Sparky), all throws (Ball), Chef, Judge and Oil Panic.
    • Change This significantly changes most of Mr. Game & Watch's attack animations both functionally and aesthetically, and it makes him more expressive overall.
  • Change Mr. Game & Watch's walking animation has been changed, now looking less flippant.
  • Change Like in Melee, Mr. Game & Watch now makes a noise when getting KOed, and he also has a new sound for getting Star KOed. Both use the sound of his up and side taunts.
  • Change Mr. Game & Watch has a new victory animation where he juggles balls using his appearance from Ball. This replaces the victory pose where he jumps up and down.
  • Change Mr. Game & Watch's mouth is open during his clapping animation, similar to his Melee appearance.

Attributes

  • Buff Like all characters, Mr. Game & Watch's jumpsquat takes 3 frames to complete (down from 5).
  • Buff Mr. Game & Watch runs faster (1.5264 → 1.679).
  • Buff Mr. Game & Watch walks slightly faster (1.1242 → 1.18).
  • Buff Mr. Game & Watch's traction has been significantly increased (0.06 → 0.131), now tied for the 5th highest in the entire game.
  • Buff Mr. Game & Watch's air speed is slightly higher (1.12 → 1.176).
  • Nerf Forward roll has more ending lag (FAF 30 → 31) and grants less intangibility (frames 4-16 → 4-15).
  • Nerf Back roll has more startup with less intangibility (frames 4-16 → 5-16), and more ending lag (FAF 30 → 36).
  • Nerf Spot dodge has more startup (frame 2 → 3).
  • Nerf Air dodge has more startup (frame 2 → 3) and significantly more ending lag (FAF 32 → 60).
  • Buff Air dodge grants more intangibility (frames 2-26 → 3-28).
  • Buff The reintroduction of directional air dodges improves Mr. Game & Watch's recovery more than other characters', as due to Fire not causing helplessness, he can get additional distance with a directional air dodge after using it.
  • Change Mr. Game & Watch has his hurtboxes modeled to match the new animation changes made to his attacks. This increases his hurtbox size for some of his attacks (notably Chef and up tilt), but reduces it for others (notably down tilt and neutral attack).

Ground attacks

  • Neutral attack:
    • Buff The first hit transitions into the neutral infinite faster (frame 12 → 7).
    • Buff The first hit and infinite have altered angles to keep opponents closer to Mr. Game & Watch (83°/85° → 361°/180° (hit 1), 74°/40° → 361° (infinite)), and the latter has gained a hitstun modifier of 4, allowing the move to lock opponents and connect better.
    • Buff The infinite's finisher deals more damage (2% → 3%), with its knockback scaling not fully compensated (180 → 160).
    • Buff The infinite has gained a shieldstun multiplier of 10×. This allows it to lock opponents into their shields between each hit, and thus pressure them more effectively, without allowing opponents to cancel shieldstun like other neutral infinites, as the move pushes them out of range before they can shield 10 hits.
    • Buff The finisher has a larger hitbox (5.5u/4u → 6u/4u), and its farthest hitbox is placed higher (Y offset: 8.5u → 9.5u), improving its vertical range.
    • Nerf The first hit's outer hitbox no longer deals enough hitstun to prevent opponents from shielding the rapid jab.
    • Nerf The first hit has smaller hitboxes (5.5u/4u/3u → 3.8u/4.3u), with the hitbox that reached behind Mr. Game & Watch being removed.
    • Nerf The first hit has a higher hitlag multiplier (1× → 1.5×), making it easier to SDI.
    • Nerf The infinite deal less damage per hit (1% → 0.8%).
    • Nerf The infinite no longer uses set knockback (5/10 set/100 scaling → 12 base/20 scaling), causing it to connect less reliably at high percents.
    • Nerf The finisher has considerably more ending lag (FAF 24 → 35).
    • Change The first hit no longer uses set knockback (5/10/20 set/100 scaling → 25/20 base/22/15 scaling). At high percents, this causes it to connect less reliably into the infinite, but gives it a guaranteed jab cancel followup into Fire thanks to the latter's faster startup.
    • Change The infinite has a higher hitlag multiplier (0.5× → 0.7×), but a lower SDI multiplier (1× → 0.8×).
  • Forward tilt:
    • Buff Forward tilt has less startup with a longer hitbox duration (frames 10 (clean)/11-17 (late) → 8-9/10-20).
    • Buff It deals more damage (10%/9% → 12%/10% (clean), 4% → 6% (late)) with knockback partially compensated only on the clean sweetspot (100 → 96), improving its KO potential.
    • Buff The late hit has significantly more knockback scaling (100 → 135/120). Combined with its increased damage, this grants it KO potential.
    • Nerf The move has smaller hitboxes (4.8u/4u → 4u/3.5u (clean), 4.5u/3.5u → 3.3u/2.8u (late)), the sourspot does not extend as far (Z offset: 5u-16u → 7u-12u, Y offset: 4u → 4.5u), and the sweetspot has been moved towards Mr. Game & Watch and does not extend as far vertically (Z offset: 16u → 15u, Y offset: 4u-7u → 4.5u-6.5u). This reduces its range overall.
  • Up tilt:
    • Buff Up tilt has less ending lag (FAF 36 → 34).
    • Buff It grants intangibility on Mr. Game & Watch's hands throughout the entire move, as well as his raised arm during each hit's active frames, allowing it to beat out opposing attacks more effectively.
    • Buff The first hit uses weight-independent set knockback (20 base/125/127 scaling → 60/80 set/100 scaling) and launches opponents at lower angles (100°/115° → 170°/145°), now being specifically designed to connect into the second hit. This allows the move to consistently deal its full damage and provide a higher frame advantage over the opponent.
    • Buff The second hit launches at a more vertical angle (115° → 75°). In combination with the move's reduced ending lag, consistent two-hit nature, and Mr. Game & Watch's faster jumpsquat, this considerably improves its combo potential.
    • Buff The second hit has more base knockback (30 → 50), but less knockback scaling (127/125 → 117), improving its KO potential overall.
    • Nerf Both hits' flags have smaller hitboxes (5.5u → 4.5u).
    • Change The flags appear on each side of Mr. Game & Watch instead of above. This increases the move's horizontal range, but reduces its vertical range.
  • Down tilt:
    • Buff Down tilt deals more damage (6% → 9%) with knockback not fully compensated (40 base/125 scaling → 45/112), drastically improving its KO potential to the point it is the strongest down tilt at the edge (KOing at around 90%), and one of the strongest down tilts from center stage (KOing at around 130%).
    • Buff The hitbox is placed higher, and it has gained an additional hitbox that extends much farther vertically (Y offset: 1.5u → 2.1u-9.3u), improving its coverage in front of Mr. Game & Watch.
    • Nerf The move has more ending lag (FAF 40 → 43).
    • Nerf It has a shorter hitbox duration (frames 6-11 → 6-8).
    • Nerf The windbox has been removed. This deprives the move of its juggling capabilities and potential recovery interruptions (such as when used against Ike's Quick Draw), and it can no longer hit aerial opponents as a result.
    • Nerf The hitboxes are much smaller (2.5u → 1.2u/1.2u), and extend farther horizontally, but are placed closer to Mr. Game & Watch (Z offset: 12u-18u → 6.7u-16.8u). This reduces their horizontal range overall, and gives them a much less favorable disjoint due to Mr. Game & Watch leaning in further during the attack.
  • Dash attack:
    • Nerf The hitbox has been moved closer to Mr. Game & Watch (Z offset: 6u → 5u), reducing its horizontal range.
  • Forward smash:
    • Buff The sweetspot deals more knockback overall (48 base/91 scaling → 46/97), and launches at a lower angle (52° → 48°), improving its KO potential.
    • Buff The move has gained an additional sweetspot hitbox inbetween the sourspot and existing sweetspot (5.3u → 2.9u/5.3u), while the sourspot has been slightly reduced to compensate (3u → 2.6u). This makes the sweetspot easier to land.
    • Nerf The sourspot has less base knockback (44 → 42).
    • Change All hitboxes have been moved closer to Mr. Game & Watch (Z offset: 11u → 7.8u (sourspot), 17u → 12u/16u (sweetspot)) and upwards (Y offset: 3.5u → 5.3u (sourspot), 7.2u → 6.8u/7.8u (sweetspot)). Additionally, he doesn't lean forward as much. This reduces the move's horizontal range, but increases its vertical range and gives it a more favorable disjoint.
    • Change The sourspot no longer has a sound effect on hit.
  • Up smash:
    • Buff Up smash has less startup with a longer hitbox duration (frames 24-25 → 21-25), matching its Brawl counterpart.
    • Buff It grants full invincibility to Mr. Game & Watch, rather than only to his head and frontal limbs.
    • Buff It has more knockback scaling (93 → 98), improving its KO potential.
    • Nerf It has a significantly shorter invincibility period, matching the duration of the hitboxes (frames 4-25 → 21-25). This prevents it from negating opposing attacks much earlier than the hitbox comes out, as well as during the whole period it is charged.
    • Change The hitbox has been moved lower (Y offset: 12u-10u → 9.5u-8u), but also extends farther horizontally (Z offset: −3u-6u → −6u-5.5u). This noticeably reduces its vertical range, but increases its horizontal range, especially behind Mr. Game & Watch.
    • Change Mr. Game & Watch faces away from the camera when using his up smash to the left.
  • Down smash:
    • Buff Down smash has less startup (frame 15 → 12) and ending lag (FAF 42 → 38).
    • Buff The sweetspots bury grounded opponents, allowing them to followup into several other moves, including stronger finishers at high percents.
    • Buff The sourspot has significantly more knockback scaling (65 → 80), allowing it to KO under 150% from the center of Final Destination.
    • Buff All hitboxes extend farther to both sides (Z offset: -4.8u-4.8u → -5u-5u (sourspot), -12u/12u → -14.2u-−12.2u/14.2u-12.2u (sweetspots)), increasing the move's horizontal range and making the sweetspots easier to land.
    • Nerf The sweetspots are smaller (5u → 4.5u), slightly reducing their vertical range.

Aerial attacks

  • Buff Neutral, back, and down aerial have less landing lag (12 → 7 frames (neutral), 19 → 18 (back), 28 → 22 (down)).
  • Neutral aerial:
    • Buff Neutral aerial auto-cancels earlier (frame 44 → 42).
    • Buff All hits have significantly longer durations (frames 7/12/17/22 → 7-10/12-15/17-20/22-23), much like the move's Brawl iteration.
    • Buff All of the move's hitboxes except the first hit's fish hitboxes are stretched horizontally (Z offset: 1.8u → −1u-6u/−1u-6u (hit 1), −9.5u/9.8u/1.8u → 9.6u-10.8u/−7.5u-−8.8u/−1u-6u/−1u-6u (hit 2), −11u/13u/1.8u → 13.3u-13.6u/−9.9u-−9.7u/−1-6u/−1-6u (hit 3), −11u/12.7u → −10.2u-10u/1.8u-3.4u (hit 4)) and vertically (Y offset: 17.9u/21u → 20.7u-21u/17.9u-18.3u (hit 2), 11u/12.5u → 12.4u-13.6u/11u-12u (hit 3), 1u/1.5u → 1.5u-2.9u/2.4u-1u (hit 4)), increasing the range of each hitbox.
    • Buff Due to its reduced landing lag, it has greatly improved combo potential, even allowing the multi-hits to set up into moves such as down tilt and forward tilt at KO percents.
    • Buff The first three hits have a lower hitlag multiplier (1× → 0.8×), making them harder to SDI out of.
    • Buff The first three hits launch at different angles, with the first two using autolink angles (160°/160°/90° → 165°/165°/367°/105° (hit 1), 160°/150°/367°/105° (hit 2), 145°/140°/120°/120° (hit 3)), and all of their hitboxes deal weight-independent set knockback (30/30/0 → 30/30/30/45 (hit 1), 30/30/20/20 (hit 2), 30/30/15/15 (hit 3)), improving their linking ability and preventing opponents from falling out at higher percents.
    • Nerf The move deals less damage (5% (hit 1), 4% (hits 2-3) → 3%; 17% total → 13%).
    • Nerf The last hit has a higher hitlag multiplier (1× → 2×), making it easier to DI.
    • Change The first three hit have had their large hitbox replaced by two small ones (5u → 2.5u/2.5u (hit 1), 5u → 3u/3u (hits 2-3)).
  • Forward aerial:
    • Change Mr. Game & Watch has a new forward aerial: he holds a bomb in front of him and drops it straight down, based on Mario's Bombs Away. Uniquely, the bomb functions as a projectile, exploding half a second (30 frames) after it is dropped or when it hits the stage. The move consists of both hits; one in front of Mr. Game & Watch when he drops the bomb, which deals 3% damage, and the other on the bomb's explosion, which deals 12%. The bomb does not explode upon hitting an opponent, and any attack that hits it will cause it to disappear.
    • Buff It deals more damage if both hits connect (11.5% → 15%).
    • Buff The explosion has significantly more knockback scaling (86 → 101), which alongside its higher damage output than the previous forward aerial improves its KO potential.
    • Buff Due to its new properties, it has increased vertical range below Mr. Game & Watch.
    • Buff The delayed explosion significantly improves the move's safety as a landing option against shielding opponents, to the point it is nearly impossible to punish after shielding it, despite its increased landing lag. It also grants the move combo potential, and allows it to hit offstage opponents below the ledge.
    • Buff The explosion has a much larger hitbox (5.5u → 10u).
    • Nerf The move has more ending lag (FAF 45 → 48) and landing lag (15 frames → 17).
    • Nerf Its initial auto-cancel window has been removed.
    • Nerf The hit in front of Mr. Game & Watch has a much smaller hitbox (5.5u → 2u), noticeably smaller than the bomb. This drastically reduces its range, despite being placed slightly farther horizontally (Z offset: 9u → 9.3u).
    • Nerf Both the initial hit and explosion have a much shorter duration (frames 10-25 → 10-13 (bomb), 44-45 (explosion)), and the bomb's susceptibility to being canceled out by opposing attacks leaves Mr. Game & Watch completely vulnerable if it trades with an opposing attack. This makes the move significantly less effective for attacking and approaching directly.
    • Change Both hits have a lower hitlag multiplier (1× → 0.5×).
    • Change The initial hit uses set knockback (30/10 base/86/80 scaling → 30 set/50 scaling) and a hitstun modifier of 5, in order to link consistently into the explosion when close to the ground.
    • Change The explosion launches at a higher angle (361° → 45°). This further improves its combo potential, but makes it less effective for edgeguarding.
  • Back aerial:
    • Buff The looping hits consistently use an autolink angle (366°/25° → 367°/367°), allowing them to connect reliably, despite the outermost hitbox dealing more knockback overall and the innermost hitbox no longer using set knockback (30/0 base/0/40 set/40/100 scaling → 0 base/100 scaling).
    • Buff The looping hits have a lower hitlag multiplier (1.5× → 0.9×), allowing them to transition faster.
    • Buff The last hit has more knockback scaling (170 → 185), improving its KO potential.
    • Nerf The move can no longer be frame canceled. Its reduced landing lag does not compensate, hindering its combo potential and safety on shield.
    • Nerf The landing hit launches at a lower angle (68° → 58°) and deals much less knockback overall (90 base/120 scaling → 95/60). In combination with the removal of frame canceling, this removes both its combo potential and its ability to KO at realistic percents.
    • Change The move has a slightly altered animation where Mr. Game & Watch has his legs positioned to the side of his body rather than below it.
  • Up aerial:
    • Change Up aerial has been reworked: it shoots a single puff of air that functions as a projectile, flying straight up and hitting multiple times, much like Mega Man's up aerial.
    • Buff Due to its new properties, it has much more vertical range, making it a more reliable followup option.
    • Buff It has a much longer duration (frames 6-12/20-22 → 9-14/15-20/21-26/27-32/33-36/37-42), significantly improving its juggling potential.
    • Buff The looping hits launch opponents more inward (94° → 97°) and use set knockback (20 base/60 scaling → 63/55/40 set/100 scaling), and the move no longer causes hitlag (1× → 0×). This allows for all hits to connect more reliably and makes them nearly impossible to escape.
    • Nerf The move has more startup (frame 6 → 9), with its total duration increased as well (FAF 40 → 43), being interruptibile just after the hitboxes cease.
    • Nerf It auto-cancels later (frame 41 → 44) and no longer has an initial auto-cancel window.
    • Nerf It deals less damage (7% (hit 1), 9% (hit 2) → 1.8% (hits 1-5), 3% (hit 6); 16% total → 12%).
    • Nerf The hitbox is much smaller overall (6.5u/4.3u → 3.8u (hits 1-5), 4.3u (hit 6)), reducing its horizontal range.
    • Change It no longer possesses windboxes, allowing it to hit consistently without pushing opponents out of range, but removing the ability to juggle opponents during vulnerable states (such as helplessness).
    • Change The last hit deals significantly less knockback (55 base/98 scaling → 65/35). This removes its KO potential, but in combination with its longer duration and multi-hit nature, this allows it to combo far more effectively into other moves, including another up aerial to carry the opponent closer to the top blast line.
  • Down aerial:
    • Buff The removal of teching for grounded meteor smashes improves down aerial's combo potential onstage, compounded further by its reduced landing lag.
    • Buff It auto-cancels earlier (frame 51 → 49), matching its interruptibility, and allowing it to auto-cancel after a full hop and Fire.
    • Buff The late hit deals much more knockback (20 base/106 scaling → 22/117), improving its KO potential.
    • Change The move can no longer be frame canceled; however, this is compensated by its reduced landing lag.
    • Change The key is larger, matching the vertical range of the sourspot more closely.

Throws and other attacks

  • Grabs:
    • Nerf All grabs have more ending lag (FAF 30 → 35 (standing), 37 → 43 (dash), 35 → 37 (pivot)).
    • Buff Dash grab and pivot grab have increased range, especially dash grab (Z2 offset: 11.1u → 13.5u (dash), -14.8u → −15.6u (pivot)).
    • Nerf Dash and pivot grab have more startup (frame 8 → 9 (dash), 9 → 10 (pivot)).
  • Change When a playable character is thrown by Mr. Game & Watch, they turn into their stock icon for the duration of the juggle; combined with the new, more flatter look of stock icons, it greatly resembles a ball in the original game. Squirtle, Ivysaur and Charizard use their own stock icons instead of the trainer’s. Grabbable Assist Trophies still uses Smash 4's grab animation.
  • Pummel:
    • Buff Pummel deals more hitlag (5 frames → 14), but has significantly less startup (frame 13 → 1), and ending lag (FAF 30 → 7), greatly shortening its duration and making it more reliable for racking up damage.
    • Nerf It deals much less damage (3% → 1.3%).
  • Forward throw:
    • Buff Forward throw launches at a lower angle (58° → 52°), making it more effective for getting opponents offstage.
  • Back throw:
    • Buff Back throw launches at a lower angle (58° → 52°), making it more effective for getting opponents offstage.
  • Up throw:
    • Buff Up throw deals much more damage (8% → 12%), with its knockback scaling compensated (40 → 29).
    • Buff It has increased combo ability due to Mr. Game & Watch's faster jumpsquat and jump speed; in addition to Fire, it can combo into neutral aerial and up aerial at low percents.
  • Down throw:
    • Nerf Down throw releases the opponent later (frame 26 → 35), with its total duration increased as well (FAF 41 → 50), giving the opponent more time to DI.
    • Change It has significantly more base knockback (35 → 70). This worsens its combo potential at mid to high percents, and when combined with the changes to up aerial, effectively removes the "Toot-Toot" KO confirm he could pull off in Smash 4. However, this also increases its combo potential at low to mid percents in combination with Mr. Game & Watch faster jumpsquat, and grants it KO potential at around 200%.
    • Change Mr. Game & Watch "drops" the character's icon during the animation.
  • Edge attack:
    • Buff Edge attack deals more damage (7% → 9%).

Special moves

  • Chef:
    • Buff Chef deals more damage (5% → 8% (pan), 4% → 5% (food)) without compensation for knockback, although the food deals negative shield damage to compensate (0 → -1).
    • Buff The food's trajectory can be controlled by tilting the control stick horizontally, rather than being randomized, improving its consistency as a ledge-trapping and zoning option.
    • Nerf The move has more ending lag (FAF 50 → 55).
    • Change It shoots food at a slower rate when not tapping the special move button repeatedly (23 frames → 32).
    • Change The pan hitbox has been replaced with two smaller ones (6.76u → 3.5u/4.2u).
  • Judge:
    • Buff Judge 5's first three hits have less knockback (40 base/80 scaling → 15/25 base/60/70 scaling), making it easier to hit opponents multiple times at higher percents.
    • Buff Judge 7 spawns three apples on hit instead of one, allowing Mr. Game & Watch to heal significantly more health after using the move.
    • Buff Judge 7 deals more base knockback (30 → 45), making it safer on hit at low percents.
    • Buff Judge 8 does more damage (9% → 13%), which also causes the freeze effect to last longer.
      • Change Combined with the games to freeze duration, this causes it to freeze for longer at around 90% or higher, but for less time at lower percents.
    • Buff Judge 8 deals less set knockback (70 → 60), slightly improving its gimping potential.
    • Buff Judge 9 has a larger hitbox (3u/4u → 3u/6u), matching the rest of the numbers.
    • Nerf Judge 2 no longer has a bonus trip chance of 20%, removing its situational followups.
    • Nerf Judge 7 launches at a higher angle (361° → 45°), removing its ability to lock opponents at low percents.
    • Nerf Judge 9 has a much higher SDI multiplier (0× → 2×), allowing the opponent to manipulate their launch position to improve their chances of surviving, and shift their position when shielding the move to make it easier to punish, due to its high hitlag.
    • Change Judge can no longer roll the same number twice in a row.
    • Change During startup, the numbers appear in a jumble before settling on the decided number.
    • Change Judge 9 triggers a Special Zoom on hit.
  • Fire:
    • Buff Fire's windbox has been removed, instead possessing a new hit on frames 3-4 when the firemen appear, which links into Mr. Game & Watch's own hitbox. This hit deals 3% damage, launches opponents vertically (83° (grounded), 75° (aerial)) and has very high base knockback (132 base/36 scaling (grounded), 100/70 (aerial)), with a hitstun modifier of 10 on the grounded version. This new hit effectively reduces the move's startup (frame 9 → 3) and increases its horizontal range, giving it immense utility as an out of shield and disadvantage option, and due to the grounded version's high hitstun, it has also gained combo potential, leading into a neutral aerial at low percents and an up aerial until high percents.
    • Buff It transitions into the parachute faster (FAF 41 → 37).
  • Oil Panic:
    • Buff Oil Panic reflects projectiles that aren't absorbable, increasing its utility.
    • Buff It begins absorbing projectiles earlier (frame 7 → 6).
    • Buff The absorbing portion does not need to be held for as long (30 frames → 25), reducing its ending lag if not held (FAF 50 → 44). Additionally, the absorbing portion's loop has been standardized, allowing Mr. Game & Watch to immediately go into the ending animation if the button is released after frame 30.
    • Buff Mr. Game & Watch is no longer forced into another loop after absorbing a projectile if the button is not being held. He also isn't put into the ending animation, allowing him to act the moment intangibility ends.
    • Buff Using the move in the air no longer cuts Game & Watch's air speed, improving its recovery usage.
    • Nerf The move's damage multiplier has been significantly reduced (2.8× → 2×).
    • Nerf The attack portion no longer has intangibility on frames 1-6.
    • Nerf The attack's minimum and maximum damage are lower, especially the latter (18%-60% → 16%-48%), and it deals less knockback (30 base/80 scaling → 25/80 (clean), 25/78 (mid), 25/76 (late)). This makes it significantly weaker, removing its one-hit KO ability, and further reduces its safety on hit at low percents when absorbing weak projectiles.
    • Nerf The attack has slightly smaller hitboxes overall (3.36u/4.8u/8.16u → 3.4u/4.5u/8u).
    • Change Oil Panic triggers Special Zoom on hit, and briefly leaves the opponent covered in oil.
  • Octopus:
    • Change Octopus's functionality has been altered. Instead of being controllable, the octopus automatically rears back and charges forward, grabs opponents who touch its tentacles, and drags them offscreen, akin to Ganondorf's Ganon, The Demon King. The main body deals damage instead of the tentacles. This allows the move to KO earlier, but makes it more polarized overall, as escaping the grab frees the opponent of any punishment.
    • Change A greenish-beige backdrop similar to that of a Game & Watch game temporarily appears during the Final Smash.

Update history

Mr. Game & Watch has been slightly buffed via updates; in patch update 2.0.0, forward aerial's explosion had its range increased to match the visual explosion and down aerial auto-cancels slightly earlier to match its interruptibility. 3.0.0 now has Octopus trap opponents for longer periods of time, and in patch 3.1.0, up tilt's first hit now deals weight independent set knockback, allowing it to always connect into the second hit, even at higher percents, and in 7.0.0 his shield size has been significantly increased.

Overall, the updates given to Mr. Game & Watch have largely been quality of life improvements, and his competitive standing has not significantly changed as a result.

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate 1.1.0

  • Change The feather from Mr. Game and Watch's forward smash animation was removed.

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate 2.0.0

  • Buff Forward aerial's explosion hitbox has increased range, matching the visual explosion more closely and allowing the move to catch opponents from below the ledge. This improves its edgeguarding potential.
  • Buff Down aerial auto-cancels earlier (frame 51 → 49), matching the move's interruptibility and allowing the move to auto-cancel after a full hop + Fire.
  • Bug fix Up Aerial's location reassignment glitch has been removed.
  • Bug fix Oil Panic's grounded mobility glitch has been removed.
  • Bug fix Down Taunt's air puff now correctly vanishes and reappears when interrupted.

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate 3.0.0

  • Buff Octopus traps opponents for a longer period of time (30 + percent * 2.4 → 30 + percent * 3).
  • Change Several basic animations, such as idle and crouch animations, have been adjusted.

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate 3.1.0

  • Buff Up tilt's first hit deals weight-independent set knockback, allowing it to connect more reliably into the second hit, even against lightweights.

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate 4.0.0

  • Change Down aerial no longer has its downward movement disabled when used out of hitstun.
  • Bug fix Fixed an issue that resulted Game & Watch to do a T-Pose with Fire upon hitting opponents off screen by their last stock.

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate 7.0.0

  • Buff Overall shield size has been increased by 1.125×.

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate 8.0.0

  • Buff Pummel has a larger hitbox (5u → 6u), allowing it to connect more consistently.

Moveset

For a gallery of Mr. Game & Watch's hitboxes, see here.

Note: All numbers are listed as base damage, without the 1v1 multiplier.

  Name Damage Description
Neutral attack Greenhouse (グリーンハウス) / Greenhouse (Barrage) (グリーンハウス（連打）) / Greenhouse (Finish) (グリーンハウス（フィニッシュ）) 3% (first and last hit) Rapidly presses an insecticide pump, pumping gas onto the opponent. The first hit can combo into a grab, Fire, and even Oil Panic at high percents; the finisher starts KOing middleweights at the ledge at around 150% on Final Destination. The finisher possesses a considerable amount of endlag, and is very punishable if shielded. Changes Mr. Game & Watch's model into the appearance of Stanley from Greenhouse.
0.8% (loop)
Forward tilt Lion (ライオン) 12% (clean chair), 10% (clean body), 6% (late) Thrusts a chair forward to hit with its legs. Relatively fast (frame 8) and extremely powerful, KOing at around 100% by the ledge. Its hitbox also lingers, making it effective at catching spot dodges and ledge options. Changes Mr. Game & Watch's model into a zookeeper from Lion.
Up tilt Flagman (フラッグマン) 7% (hits 1 and 2) Mr. Game & Watch swings a flag in front of him, and a flag behind him. The first hit knocks the opponent into the second one and has low ending lag, giving it combo potential at low to mid percents. However, it has noticeable start-up for a tilt attack, and it has poor reach both horizontally and vertically. No matter what side he faces, Flag 1 and Flag 2 will always be on the left and right sides, respectively. If this move is used twice in succession, with the second use facing the opposite as the first, the numbers (albeit being mirrored) will switch sides. The second hit KOs middleweights at around 160%. His hands gain intangibility during the move. Changes Mr. Game & Watch's model into the character from Flagman.
Down tilt Manhole (マンホール) 9% Pushes an angled manhole in front of himself. Does more damage than in the previous game and has much more knockback at the expense of increased endlag and reduced range. Down tilt has also lost its windbox, disallowing juggling and potential recovery interrupting, and it can no longer hit aerial opponents. Has fast startup at frame 6 and possesses extremely high knockback for a tilt of its type (making it the strongest down tilt in the game knockback-wise), killing as early as 90% by the ledge and 120% center-stage. It also semi-spikes opponents, leading to edgeguards and potentially gimping characters with poor recoveries, while acting as a hard punish to any shielded ledge attack. Changes Mr. Game & Watch's model into the main character from Manhole.
Dash attack Helmet (ヘルメット) 10% (clean), 6.5% (late) Performs a sliding headbutt while wearing a helmet. It has good range and is very fast, sliding Mr. Game & Watch forward in a choppy frame-by-frame manner, making it difficult to react to. It also lowers his hurtbox, allowing it to low-profile many attacks. This move is a tool for both risky approaching and safe punishing. Low ending lag, good knockback, and high amount of active frames make it a decent KOing option near the edge and useful for 2-framing opponents by the ledge, though the clean hit has trouble KOing from center stage until well past 180%. Originates from Helmet.
Forward smash Fire Attack (ファイアアタック) 14% (handle), 18% (flame) Swings a lit torch downward. The sweetspot is at the flame, while the sourspot is at the torch. While this move has moderate startup, coming out on frame 17, it has very little cooldown, is fully disjointed, and its sweetspot is safe on shield. While the sourspot has underwhelming knockback, the sweetspot is powerful and KOs around 90%, making it one of the stronger forward smashes. Changes Mr. Game & Watch's model to an antagonist from Fire Attack.
Up smash Octopus Headbutt (オクトパスヘッドバット) 16% Performs an upward headbutt while wearing a diving helmet. The move has noticeable start-up, coming out on frame 21, but has an extremely low cool down of only 13 frames and a deceptively long duration of 5 frames, making it a reliable baiting tool. Useful for shield break setups with Oil Panic due to its safety and even advantage on shield. It also has combo potential into his neutral air, up air, and fire. While his whole body gains invincibility, it only lasts during the frames the hitboxes are active. The 12th strongest up smash in the game, KOing middleweights at 90% uncharged and 60% fully charged. Originates from Octopus.
Down smash Vermin (バーミン) 13% (body), 15% (hammers) Swings two hammers downward and on both of his sides. Has the fastest start-up of all of Mr. Game & Watch's smash attacks, coming out on frame 12, and possesses very fast interruptibility, with only 21 frames of cooldown. It is rather disjointed for a down smash, and when sweetspotted, it will bury opponents, which can be followed up with a forward smash, down tilt, Oil Panic, or Judge. Its sourspot sends opponents at a semi-spike angle and kills at 120% by the ledge. Its aerial sweetspot is one of the strongest down smashes in the game, KOing around 95%. As a result, down smash has become one of Mr. Game & Watch's most reliable KO'ing options and is regarded by many to be the best down smash in the game. Changes Mr. Game & Watch's model into the character from Vermin.
Neutral aerial Tropical Fish (トロピカルフィッシュ) 3% (hits 1-3), 4% (hit 4) Tosses out a pair of fish from a fishbowl. Multiple hitboxes enable it to cover every area except below him. Has the fastest start-up of all of Mr. Game & Watch's aerials (frame 7), launches opponents upward, has relatively low ending lag, and has the lowest landing lag of all of his aerials. Using the move to combo into itself and/or up aerial at low percents can deal upwards of 60% in a single combo or string. The first hit can be used as KO confirm into forward tilt or down tilt when landing with it. As a result, it has become one of Mr. Game & Watch's most effective damage-racking options and is one of his best tools for approaching. Originates from Tropical Fish.
Forward aerial Bombs Away (ボンアウェイ) 3% (bomb), 12% (explosion) Holds a bomb in front of him, dropping it downward shortly after execution. The dropped bomb acts as a projectile, as it is sent directly downwards, exploding on a half a second afterwards or when it hits the stage. As of update 2.0.0, the entirety of the explosion's radius contains the hitbox. The bomb does not explode upon hitting an opponent, and any attack that hits it will cause it to disappear. There is a weak hitbox on the bomb (shortly before Mr. Game & Watch drops it) that slightly pushes midair opponents downward that deals set knockback, disallowing it to kill at any percentage. Hitting grounded opponents with the first hit will set them up to be hit by the second. Even if an opponent is hit from behind, the explosion always launches them whichever direction Mr. Game & Watch is facing. Compared to his old forward aerial, it functions more as a poking/spacing tool than an approach option. KOs at 115% by the ledge. Originates from Mario's Bombs Away.
Back aerial Turtle Bridge (タートルブリッジ) 2% (hits 1-3), 3% (hit 4) Swings a snapping turtle behind himself. Has moderate start-up, but is also fully disjointed, hits multiple times, and has low ending lag; compounded with Mr. Game & Watch's high air acceleration, this makes it effective as an edgeguarding option and a spacing tool. It has high landing lag, however, making it easy to punish if not spaced well. Although it can't combo into itself anymore at higher percentages, its final hit is much stronger, making it a more reliable KO move off-stage. Originates from Turtle Bridge.
Up aerial Spitball Sparky (スピットボールスパーキー) 1.8% (hits 1-5), 3% (hit 6) Shoots a single puff of air upward. Similar to Mega Man's up aerial, it acts as a projectile, hits multiple times, and pushes opponents upward as it rises. It has much more damage-racking and juggling capabilities than his SSB4 up aerial at the expense of losing all of its KO power. Despite its complete lack of KO potential, it is notorious for being an incredible juggling tool due to its very long range, decent damage, low knockback, and low commitment, making it a core part of Mr. Game & Watch's combo game, and can be a big contributing factor to many of his best matchups due to how difficult it is for many opponents to escape. The move now has Mr. Game & Watch's model look more like the character from Spitball Sparky.
Down aerial Donkey Kong Jr. (ドンキーコングＪｒ．) 11% (key), 3.5% (landing) Drops downward while holding a key beneath himself. A stall-then-fall, it meteor smashes powerfully on the first frames. It can be moved left or right slightly during descent. While it can potentially cause Mr. Game & Watch to self-destruct while using it off-stage, his effective recovery, coupled with its low endlag and the move being slower than other stall-then-falls makes this unlikely. While the move has rather high landing lag, the landing hitbox can make it tricky to punish on whiff. It is a safe option when edgeguarding and has KO potential at high percents, killing at 130%. The meteor smash is strong enough to directly KO as low as 65%, or even less depening on the opponent's recovery options. Originates from the Game & Watch version of Donkey Kong Jr.
Grab Grab (つかみ) — Mr. Game & Watch reaches in front of himself. While standing grab has poor range, both his dash and pivot grabs have massively disjointed range. All of his grabs are also among the fastest in the game, but has moderate ending lag. Originates from how Mario pulls levers in Mario's Cement Factory.
Pummel Alarm (アラーム) 1.3% Hits the opponent with a bell. Originates from the alarm feature on the "Wide Screen" and "Multi Screen" Game & Watch series.
Forward throw Ball (Front) (ボール（前）) 8% Juggles the opponent and tosses them forward. Has little utility beyond throwing the opponent offstage. Changes Mr. Game & Watch's model into the character from Ball.
Back throw Ball (Back) (ボール（後）) 8% Juggles the opponent and tosses them backward. Has little utility beyond throwing the opponent offstage. Changes Mr. Game & Watch's model into the character from Ball.
Up throw Ball (Above) (ボール（上）) 12% Juggles the opponent and tosses them upward. Although it's not as versatile as down throw in terms of follow-up potential, it's an effective combo starter, and can be followed up with up aerial or neutral aerial at low percents or Fire at high percents. Changes Mr. Game & Watch's model into the character from Ball.
Down throw Ball (Below) (ボール（下）) 4% Juggles the opponent and drops them on the ground behind him. Launches opponents upward. Mr. Game & Watch's only KO throw, but still does not KO middleweights until around 200%. At low to mid percents, it's a reliable combo starter, and can be followed up with neutral air, Judge, Fire, or up air. Changes Mr. Game & Watch's model into the character from Ball.
Forward roll
Back roll
Spot dodge
Air dodge 		— —
Techs — —
Floor attack (front)
Floor getups (front) 		  7% Swings a hammer downward in front of himself and then behind himself. Originates from Vermin.
Floor attack (back)
Floor getups (back) 		  7% Swings a hammer downward behind himself and then in front of himself. Originates from Vermin.
Floor attack (trip)
Floor getups (trip) 		  5% Swings a hammer downward in front of himself and then behind himself. Originates from Vermin.
Edge attack
Edge getups 		  9% Swings a bell forward while climbing up. Originates from the Game & Watch's alarm feature on the "Wide Screen" and "Multi Screen" Game & Watch series.
Neutral special Chef 5% (food), 8% (frying pan) Flips various food-shaped projectiles out of a frying pan, moving slowly through the air. The trajectory can be controlled by tilting the stick forward and/or backward. By tapping the button, the food will be flung at a faster frequency. The food can be used defensively to cancel attack animations of opponents as a zoning tool as well as to prevent aerial approaches and can be used for edgeguarding against opponents with linear recoveries. Hitting with the pan itself deals flame damage, and acts as a semi-spike. Mr. Game & Watch's model changes into the character from Chef.
Side special Judge Varies Swings a hammer in front of him in an arc, and raises a digital display with a random number from 1-9 with his other hand. It can have any one of 9 effects, which vary based on number; 1 only damages himself, while 9 is strong enough to almost always be a one-hit KO. Mr. Game & Watch's model changes into a character from Judge.
  • Judge 1: An extremely weak swing that does not make the opponent flinch. It is the least damaging Judge attack and deals 12% recoil damage regardless of whether or not it hits.
  • Judge 2: A weak swing that deals minimal knockback. Can lock and has a 20% chance of tripping the opponent.
  • Judge 3: A weak swing. It sends opponents in the opposite direction from where Mr. Game & Watch is facing. It deals 25% shield damage.
  • Judge 4: A swing that has a slash effect and launches opponents diagonally forward.
  • Judge 5: A swing that has an electric effect and hits up to 4 times.
  • Judge 6: A swing that has a flame effect and is a semi-spike. Has the second strongest knockback of all Judge attacks.
  • Judge 7: A swing that deals moderate knockback and produces 3 apples if it hits the opponent. Each apple heals 4%.
  • Judge 8: A swing that has a freeze effect and deals very low knockback. Emits the "ping" sound effect that is usually associated with one-hit KOs.
  • Judge 9: An extremely powerful swing that deals very high knockback. It is the most damaging Judge attack and emits the "ping" sound effect like Judge 8. Similar in nature to a charged swing from the Home-Run Bat, but the hit's base knockback is much lower, which prevents it from being a true OHKO. When used fresh with enough rage, it will KO every character in the game at 0% at the edge of Final Destination.
Up special Fire 3% (trampoline; firemen), 6% (ascent) Jumps off a trampoline and then descends while wearing a parachute. Has the second-fastest start-up of all of Mr. Game & Watch's attacks (frame 3), hits behind and in front of him, and launches opponents directly upward, granting the move combo potential, even at high percents. Capable of canceling into any move when falling. Because Mr. Game & Watch becomes intangible during his ascent and both hitboxes have good knockback, Fire is a good edgeguarding move offstage and a deadly stage spike when recovering low. It is Mr. Game & Watch's most effective OoS option, and is considered the best in the game. Originates from Fire.
Down special Oil Panic 16%-48% (2x multiplier) Takes out a bucket, which absorbs energy-based projectiles, and reflects physical ones. Projectiles reflected will not be amplified, sped up, or have their duration refreshed. Once three units are absorbed, it turns into a powerful attack consisting of Mr. Game & Watch sending out a large splash of oil from his oil drum. No matter the strength of the oil, this move will always trigger Special Zoom. A max power Oil Panic will almost certainly OHKO and destroy full shields, while the least powerful Oil Panic can KO middleweights at the ledge around 95%. Comes out on frame 2, and with these traits Oil Panic is an incredibly dangerous move. Any opponent hit will be covered in oil for a brief moment. Mr. Game & Watch's model changes into the playable character from Oil Panic.
Final Smash Octopus 4.9% (grabbed), 15% (body), 30% (slam) Transforms into the large octopus that appears in its eponymous game, Octopus, rears back and charges forward. The octopus can move up or down, only. Any opponents who touch its tentacles will be grabbed and dragged offscreen by the octopus, taking gradual damage. Touching the main body will just deal damage. Just like in the previous game, pressing the attack button will extend the length of the tentacles. By button-mashing, however, opponents can escape. The octopus can also go through walls and stages; any grabbed opponents who make contact with walls or floors will take damage and be launched. After reaching the blast line, Mr. Game & Watch will return back to his previous position.

Judge Damage

Numbers Damage
1 2%
2 4%
3 6%
4 8%
5 3% (hits 1-4)
6 12%
7 14%
8 13%
9 32%

Oil Panic scaling

The greater damage an absorbed energy-based projectile is supposed to deal, the higher damage the oil spill will deal. Oil Panic will multiply the damage per unit by 2, though the result is capped at 16%. As a result, the maximum damage Oil Panic deals is 48%. So for example, if 20%, 12% and 4% enter Oil Panic, the result will be 40% dealt not considering factors such as the 1v1 multiplier and stale-move negation. [1]

Strong projectiles can fill two to three bucket units at once. If a move deals 10% (eg. Trick Shot), it will fill the bucket by two units. However, if a move deals 20% (Sun Salutation at max charge), it will fill by three. For each additional unit filled in one go, 8% is deducted from the previous unit, making it deal less damage overall.

Hero's special move Snooze launches an energy-based projectile that can be absorbed despite not dealing any damage. Absorbing it fills the bucket by one unit and adds 6.7% damage to the bucket.

Stats

Stats Weight Dash speed Walk speed Traction Air friction Air speed Air acceleration Gravity Falling speed Jumpsquat Jump height Double jump height
Value 75 1.98 – Initial dash
1.679 – Run 		1.18 0.131 0.012 1.176 0.07 – Base
0.03 – Additional 		0.08 1.24 – Base
1.984 – Fast-fall 		3 27.51 - Base
13.26 - Short hop 		27.51

Announcer call

Sound.png This article could use additional or higher-quality audio files.
The editor who added this tag suggests: Needs announcer calls from other languages.
If you have a good audio file for this article, upload it here.

  • English/Japanese/Chinese

On-screen appearance

  • Moves along a row of Game & Watch LCD frames until reaching the foreground.
  • Mr. Game & Watch's on-screen appearance

    Mr. Game & Watch's on-screen appearance

Taunts

  • Up Taunt: Rings his bell at a high angle. Similar to his side taunt, it originates from the Game & Watch's alarm feature.
  • Side Taunt: Rings his bell at a low angle. Similar to his up taunt, it originates from the Game & Watch's alarm feature.
  • Down Taunt: Sits down and catches his breath. Originates from the Game & Watch version of Mario Bros., when Mario and Luigi finished a level.
  • Mr. Game & Watch's up taunt.

    Mr. Game & Watch's up taunt.

  • Mr. Game & Watch's side taunt.

    Mr. Game & Watch's side taunt.

  • Mr. Game & Watch's down taunt.

    Mr. Game & Watch's down taunt.

Idle poses

  • Hops in place.
  • Briefly looks behind himself.
  • Mr. Game & Watch first idle pose.

    Mr. Game & Watch first idle pose.

  • Mr. Game & Watch second idle pose.

    Mr. Game & Watch second idle pose.

Crowd cheer

Cheer (English) Cheer (Japanese/Chinese) Cheer (Italian) Cheer (Dutch) Cheer (French)
Cheer
NTSC

PAL
Description Game - And - Watch! Game - And - Watch! Mis - ter -- Game and Watch! Game - And - Watch! Mis - ter -- Game and Watch!
Cheer (German) Cheer (Spanish) Cheer (Russian) Cheer (Korean)
Cheer
NTSC

PAL
Description Mis - ter -- Game and Watch! Game - And - Watch! Gos - po - din! Game - And - Watch! Game - And - Watch!

Victory poses

  • Left: Rings his bell to his left, then his right. Afterwards, he continues to ring his bell to his left.
  • Up: Hops about in choppy poses, tripping halfway, before teetering on one foot. He then proceeds to jump back and forth, landing on his feet, then his head.
  • Right: Juggles 3 balls while in his appearance from Ball.
An original melody with an energetic tempo, based upon the typical bleeping noises that characters or other objects in a Game & Watch unit would make.
  • MrGame&WatchVictoryPose1SSBU.gif
  • MrGame&WatchVictoryPose2SSBU.gif
  • MrGame&WatchVictoryPose3SSBU.gif

In competitive play

Most historically significant players

See also: Category:Mr. Game & Watch players (SSBU)

  • Chile Frido - Known as one of the best players in South America, winning several notable South American events such as Zenkoku Taikai. He has also seen success outside of South America, placing 25th at the major Smash Factor 8 and the Smash World Tour 2021 Last Chance Qualifier. He passed away on May 30th, 2023.
  • Japan Kaeru - The second-best Mr. Game & Watch player in Japan. Although his major results have been mixed, he has seen far more success at regionals and superregionals, including placing 4th at the superregional Toyota Grand Slum 13 and 5th at the superregional Chūbu Smash Chronicle 2.
  • Mexico Maister - He was the first Mr. Game & Watch player to consistently place highly at majors and is considered one of the best Mr. Game & Watch players of all time, as well as the definitive best from 2019 until Miya's rise in mid-2022.
  • Japan Miya - One of the Four Horsemen and is the best Mr. Game & Watch player of all-time and one of the best players in the world in 2023. He came to prominence after his unexpected victory at Kagaribi 8 and has since won many other majors and supermajors.
  • USA Monte - The best Mr. Game & Watch player in the United States who frequently places well at majors, including 17th at the supermajors GENESIS 8 and Mainstage 2022.
  • Mexico Regi Shikimi - One of the best Mr. Game & Watch players in the world in the early metagame, notably placing 7th at the major Smash Factor 8 and 33rd at the supermajor GENESIS 6. He was also a top 10 player in Mexico, ranking as high as 7th on the Mexican Power Rankings.

Tier placement and history

Upon the release of Ultimate, Mr. Game & Watch's competitive reception was mostly poor; this was because many players considered the nerfs he received - particularly the lack of priority on his new forward aerial, the reduction of invincibility frames on his up smash, and the loss of his "Toot-Toot" KO confirm - as significant enough to outweigh the buffs he was given. Likely as a result, most players considered him a low-tier or even a bottom-tier character, and the character saw little representation in competitive play. However, it later became clear that the buffs were far more significant than the nerfs. In particular, Mr. Game & Watch has a strong advantage state due to his aerial juggling game, an amazing out-of-shield option (as his up special has a startup of 3 frames and is invincible on frame 5), and low ending lag on his smash attacks, with down smash burying opponents, allowing for easy KOs as well. This rise in perception was due to the rise of Maister, who having struggled a bit in the first few months of the game, saw many strong results following the end of the first PGRU season.

These revelations and results helped boost Mr. Game & Watch's perception in the community, with players considering Mr. Game & Watch to be high or top-tier, with some designating him as one of the best characters in the entire game. This perception continues to remain today thanks to Maister's continued strong results, as well as the rise of Miya, resulting in him being ranked 18th on the first and current tier list.

Classic Mode: A Long Legacy

Mr. Game & Watch's congratulations screen.

Mr. Game & Watch fights classic characters on retro stages, with most of the music sourced directly from retro games. They are fought in reverse order of release dates, similar to All-Star Mode in Super Smash Bros. for Wii U, except for Pac-Man, who is ordered between Kirby and Duck Hunt, rather than between Donkey Kong and the Mr. Game & Watch horde. This is likely a reference to the Nintendo Entertainment System version of Pac-Man, which released in 1984, fitting with the order of release dates.

Round Opponent Stage Music Notes
1 Kirby (SSBU) Kirby Dream Land GB Kirby Retro Medley (Green Greens) Kirby has his white alternate costume equipped, referencing his monochromatic appearance in Kirby's Dream Land.
2 Pac-Man (SSBU) Pac-Man Pac-Land PAC-MAN
3 Duck Hunt (SSBU) Duck Hunt Duck Hunt Famicom Medley
4 Mario (SSBU) Mario and Luigi (SSBU) Luigi Mario Bros. Ground Theme - Super Mario Bros. Free-for-All.
5 Donkey Kong (SSBU) Donkey Kong 75m 25m Theme Mario (SSBU) Mario is a CPU ally, as a reference to him appearing in the original Donkey Kong. Donkey Kong's red costume references his appearance in said game.
6 Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU) Mr. Game & Watch (×6) Flat Zone X Flat Zone Horde Battle.
If any of these costumes are being used by the player, the Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU) default Mr. Game & Watch will substitute for that costume.
Bonus Stage
Final Master Hand Final Destination Master Hand (Less than 7.0 intensity)
Master Hand / Crazy Hand (7.0 or higher intensity)		 On intensity 7.0 and higher, Crazy Hand fights alongside Master Hand.

Credits roll after completing Classic Mode. Completing it as Mr. Game & Watch has Flat Zone 2 accompany the credits.

Role in World of Light

Finding Mr. Game & Watch in World of Light

Although Mr. Game & Watch does not appear in the World of Light opening cutscene, he was vaporized and later imprisoned alongside the rest of the fighters (sans Kirby) when Galeem unleashed his beams of light.

Mr. Game & Watch is unlocked in the area reminiscent of PAC-MAZE of The Light Realm. He can be found by going through the teleporters to find the correct path. After finding the correct path through the maze, the player must defeat the Sidestepper and Nikki spirits blocking him.

Fighter Battle

No. Image Name Type Power Stage Music
26
Mr. Game & Watch SSBU.png
 Mr. Game & Watch
Shield
Shield
 7,500 Flat Zone X (Ω form) Flat Zone 2

Spirits

Mr. Game & Watch's fighter spirit can be obtained by completing Classic Mode. It is also available periodically for purchase in the shop for 300 Gold, but only after Mr. Game & Watch has been unlocked. Unlocking Mr. Game & Watch in World of Light allows the player to preview the first spirit below in the Spirit List under the name "???". As a fighter spirit, it cannot be used in Spirit Battles and is purely aesthetic. His fighter spirit has an alternate version that replaces it with his artwork in Ultimate.

  • 689. Mr. Game & Watch

    689. Mr. Game & Watch

  • 690. Ball

    690. Ball

  • 691. Flagman

    691. Flagman

  • 692. Fire

    692. Fire

  • 693. Judge

    693. Judge

  • 694. Manhole

    694. Manhole

  • 695. Helmet

    695. Helmet

  • 696. Lion

    696. Lion

  • 698. Octopus

    698. Octopus

  • 699. Chef

    699. Chef

  • 701. Fire Attack

    701. Fire Attack

  • 702. Oil Panic

    702. Oil Panic

In Spirit Battles

As the main opponent

Spirit Battle parameters Inspiration
No. Image Name Series Enemy Fighter(s) Type Power Stage Rules Conditions Music Character
98
SSBU spirit Vivian.png
 Vivian Paper Mario Series •Clear Mr. Game & Watch Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)
Shield
 3,600 Luigi's Mansion (Battlefield form) N/A •The enemy is invisible Paper Mario Medley
113
SSBU spirit Sidestepper.png
 Sidestepper Mario Bros. Series •Mr. Game & Watch Team Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)×8 Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)×4
Attack
 1,900 Mario Bros. •Move Speed ↑ •The enemy has increased move speed after a little while
•The enemy can deal damage by dashing into you
•Reinforcements will appear after an enemy is KO'd 		Mario Bros.
233
SSBU spirit Wall-Merged Link.png
 Wall-Merged Link The Legend of Zelda Series •Mr. Game & Watch Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)
•Young Link Young Link (SSBU)
Neutral
 3,500 Flat Zone X N/A •Reinforcements will appear after an enemy is KO'd Lorule Main Theme
473
SSBU spirit Unown.png
 Unown Pokémon Series •Tiny Mr. Game & Watch Team Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)×8
Grab
 1,800 Temple (Battlefield form) N/A •Defeat an army of fighters Pokémon Red / Pokémon Blue Medley
489
SSBU spirit Shedinja.png
 Shedinja Pokémon Series •Reflect Mr. Game & Watch Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU) (1 HP)
Shield
 4,000 Luigi's Mansion •Temporary Invincibility •The enemy reflects projectiles
•The enemy will occasionally be invincible
•Stamina battle 		Battle! (Wild Pokémon) - Pokémon Ruby / Pokémon Sapphire
512
SSBU spirit Giratina (Altered Forme).png
 Giratina (Altered Forme) Pokémon Series •Giant Mr. Game & Watch Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)
Neutral
 9,500 Spear Pillar (hazards off) •Hazard: Screen Flip •The screen will suddenly flip after a little while
•Only certain Pokémon will emerge from Poké Balls (Giratina)
•The enemy is giant 		Battle! (Dialga/Palkia) / Spear Pillar
523
SSBU spirit Chandelure.png
 Chandelure Pokémon Series •Mr. Game & Watch Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)
Attack
 4,100 Luigi's Mansion (Battlefield form) •Hazard: Lava Floor •The floor is lava Battle! (Reshiram / Zekrom)
575
From the game's files
 Buzz Buzz EarthBound Series •Tiny Mr. Game & Watch Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU) (300%)
Attack
 2,900 Onett (hazards off) N/A •Timed battle (0:30) Humoresque of a Little Dog
598
octoman
 Octoman F-Zero Series •Mr. Game & Watch Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)
Grab
 3,700 Port Town Aero Dive (Battlefield form) •Sudden Final Smash •The enemy will suddenly have a Final Smash
•The enemy's FS Meter charges quickly 		Planet Colors
690
SSBU spirit Ball.png
 Ball Game & Watch Series •Mr. Game & Watch Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)
•Pac-Man Pac-Man (SSBU)
•Jigglypuff Jigglypuff (SSBU)
•Kirby Kirby (SSBU)
Grab
 3,900 Flat Zone X (hazards off) •Item: Balls •The enemy favors grabs and throws
•The enemy's throwing-type items have increased power 		Flat Zone 2
691
SSBU spirit Flagman.png
 Flagman Game & Watch Series •Mr. Game & Watch Team Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)×4
Grab
 4,100 Flat Zone X •Item: Special Flag •Timed battle (2:00)
•The enemy favors up tilt attacks 		Flat Zone 2
692
SSBU spirit Fire.png
 Fire Game & Watch Series •Mr. Game & Watch Team Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)×4
Attack
 9,800 Flat Zone X (hazards off) N/A •The enemy's up special has increased power
•Timed battle (1:00) 		Flat Zone 2
693
SSBU spirit Judge.png
 Judge Game & Watch Series •Mr. Game & Watch Team Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)×8
Attack
 9,400 Flat Zone X (hazards off) N/A •The enemy favors side specials
•Defeat an army of fighters 		Flat Zone 2
694
Manhole Spirit
 Manhole Game & Watch Series •Mr. Game & Watch Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)
Shield
 3,900 Flat Zone X •Item Tidal Wave
•Item: Pitfall 		•The enemy favors down tilt attacks
•Items will be pulled toward the enemy
•Certain items will appear in large numbers 		Flat Zone 2
696
Founded in a french YouTube video
 Lion Game & Watch Series •Mr. Game & Watch Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)
•Incineroar Incineroar (SSBU)
Shield
 3,600 Flat Zone X (Lion) N/A •Take your strongest team into this no-frills battle Flat Zone 2
700
Founded in a french YouTube video
 Turtle Bridge Game & Watch Series •Mr. Game & Watch Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)
•Squirtle Squirtle (SSBU)
•Morton Bowser Jr. (SSBU)
•Bowser Bowser (SSBU)
Shield
 1,700 Flat Zone X (hazards off) N/A •The enemy favors back air attacks Flat Zone
701
from the game's files
 Fire Attack Game & Watch Series •Mr. Game & Watch Team Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)×4
Shield
 2,100 Flat Zone X N/A •The enemy favors side smash attacks Flat Zone
702
Oilpanic
 Oil Panic Game & Watch Series •Mr. Game & Watch Team Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)×4
Shield
 3,900 Flat Zone X (Oil Panic) •Slippery Stage •The stage's platforms are very slippery Flat Zone
949
SSBU spirit TURN-TO-BLUE.png
 TURN-TO-BLUE PAC-MAN Series •Mr. Game & Watch Team Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)×4
Shield
 2,600 Wrecking Crew N/A •Timed battle (1:30)
•The enemy tends to avoid conflict 		PAC-MAN
1,029
from the game's files
 Li'l Judd Splatoon Series •Tiny Mr. Game & Watch Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)
•Inkling Inkling (SSBU)Inkling (SSBU)
Attack
 9,100 Moray Towers N/A •The enemy favors side specials Now or Never! (Splatfest Version) - Splatoon 2
1,108
SSBU spirit Primid.png
 Primid Super Smash Bros. Series •Mr. Game & Watch Team Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)×8
Neutral
 1,800 Pokémon Stadium (hazards off) N/A •Defeat an army of fighters Boss Battle - Super Smash Bros. Brawl
1,109
SSBU spirit Mite.png
 Mite Super Smash Bros. Series •Tiny Mr. Game & Watch Team Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)
Attack
 1,800 Shadow Moses Island N/A •Defeat an army of fighters Step: The Plain
1,112
SSBU spirit Shadow Bug.png
 Shadow Bug Super Smash Bros. Series •Mr. Game & Watch Team Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)×4
Grab
 4,300 Pokémon Stadium (Ω form) •Hazard: Poison Cloud •The stage is covered in a poisonous cloud Step: Subspace
1,228
from the game's files
 Num Diddly Make 10: A Journey of Numbers •Mr. Game & Watch Team Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)×4
Shield
 2,000 PictoChat 2 •Assist Trophy Enemies (Dr. Kawashima) •Hostile assist trophies will appear Menu - Brain Age 2: More Training in Minutes a Day!
1,341
SSBU spirit Jinjos.png
 Jinjos Banjo-Kazooie Series •Giant Mr. Game & Watch Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)
•Mr. Game & Watch Team Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)
Neutral
 3,800 Summit (Ω form) N/A •The enemy can deal damage by dashing into you
•Reinforcements will appear after an enemy is KO'd 		Freezeezy Peak The Mighty Jinjonator (Giant Mr. Game & Watch)
1,346
SSBU spirit Tockles.png
 Tockles Dragon Quest Series •Tiny Mr. Game & Watch Team Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)×3 Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)
Neutral
 9,200 Yggdrasil's Altar •Invisibility •The enemy is invisible
•Reinforcements will appear after an enemy is KO'd
•The enemy starts the battle with a Beam Sword 		The Hero Goes Forth with a Determination
1,431
SSBU spirit Creeper.png
 Creeper Minecraft Series •Mr. Game & Watch Team Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)×6
Attack
 3,500 Minecraft World (Birch Forest) •Item: Bomber •The enemy starts the battle with a Bomber
•Explosion attacks aren't as effective against the enemy
•Reinforcements will appear after an enemy is KO'd 		Toys on a Tear
•Mii Brawler Mii Brawler (SSBU)×6 (Moveset 1111, Creeper Mask, Creeper Outfit)[SB 1]

As a minion

Spirit Battle parameters Inspiration
No. Image Name Series Enemy Fighter(s) Type Power Stage Rules Conditions Music Character
746
SSBU spirit Princess Shokora.png
 Princess Shokora Wario Land Series •Peach Peach (SSBU)
•Mr. Game & Watch Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)
•Wario Wario (SSBU)
Shield
 2,900 Mushroom Kingdom II •Item: Transforming Types •Defeat the main fighter to win
•Timed battle (1:30)
•The enemy tends to avoid conflict 		Ruins - Wario Land: Shake It! Shop owner
1,248
SSBU spirit Ando Kensaku.png
 Ando Kensaku And-Kensaku •R.O.B. R.O.B. (SSBU)
•Mr. Game & Watch Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)
Grab
 2,000 PictoChat 2 (Battlefield form) •Hazard: Zap Floor •The floor is electrified
•The enemy favors side specials 		PictoChat Panel 9 minigame
1,401
SSBU spirit King Dice.png
 King Dice Cuphead •Giant Mii Swordfighter Mii Swordfighter (SSBU) (Moveset 3211,Chibi-Robo Hat, Butler Outfit)
•Tiny Mr. Game & Watch Team Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)×6
Grab
 2,300 WarioWare, Inc. N/A •Defeat the main fighter to win
•The enemy has super armor but moves slower 		Jungle Level Jazz Style (for 3DS / Wii U) Row of cards
Floral Fury[SB 1]
1,445
SSBU spirit Cait Sith.png
 Cait Sith FINAL FANTASY Series •Roy Bowser Jr. (SSBU)
•Mr. Game & Watch Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)×3
Neutral
 1,700 New Pork City (Ω form) N/A •Defeat the main fighter to win PictoChat Toy Soldiers
1,512
SSBU spirit Aqua.png
 Aqua Kingdom Hearts Series •Lucina Lucina (SSBU) (150 HP)
•Mr. Game & Watch Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)×4 (50 HP)
Shield
 9,400 Find Mii (Ω form) •Assist Trophy Enemies (Krystal) •Stamina battle
•Hostile assist trophies will appear when the enemy's at high damage
•Reinforcements will appear after an enemy is KO'd 		Night of Fate Shadow Heartless
  1. ^ a b This alternative occurs when the corresponding DLC has been purchased and downloaded.

Alternate costumes

Palette swap (SSBU)
Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU) Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU) Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU) Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU) Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU) Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU) Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU) Mr. Game & Watch (SSBU)

Gallery

Fighter Showcase Video

Trivia

Fire Attack (G&W).jpgG&W fsmash update.jpg
Magnify-clip.pngMagnify-clip.png
Mr. Game & Watch's forward smash, derived from Fire Attack, pre-patch and post-patch.
  • This is the first game in the series where Mr. Game & Watch is portrayed holding an object different than his signature bell in his official art, instead being shown holding the flag from Flagman (the same one as his up tilt). It also resembles his Alt. trophy in Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS.
    • In-game, however, Mr. Game & Watch changes his appearance to match the character in Flagman, rather than using his own appearance.
  • Mr. Game & Watch's render pose somewhat resembles his Smash 4 render, although mirrored, and the positioning of his legs has been mirrored.
    • It is also the first time in the series where his render pose shows him facing right instead of left.
  • Mr. Game & Watch, Jigglypuff, Ike, Ganondorf, Yoshi, Link, Ness, Lucas, and King Dedede are the only characters in Ultimate who have kept the same falling speed for three games in a row.
  • During the launch of Ultimate's official website, Mr. Game & Watch's name was erroneously labeled as "Mr. GAME & WATACH" exclusively on the mobile variant of his fighter page. The typo was later corrected.
  • In Pikachu's showcase trailer, Mr. Game & Watch is seen using his forward smash animation from Smash 4. However, it was later changed to reference its origin game (Fire Attack) like some of his other moves. This change attracted criticism for its portrayal of a Native American stereotype (itself sourced from the original version of Fire Attack); Nintendo of America responded to the criticism by apologizing for the outdated imagery and promising to alter it by removing the feather from Mr. Game & Watch's model,[2] matching a change seen in the Game & Watch Gallery 4 version of Fire Attack.
    • The screenshot of 4 Mr. Game & Watches on Flat Zone X has an old animation from Smash 4 on the building, in which Mr. Game & Watch retains his regular form when using his neutral attack. In the final game, Mr. Game & Watch instead changes his appearance into that of the main character of Greenhouse.
    • The Fire Attack spirit also had its artwork altered in the same patch as well, removing the feather.
  • Although Mr. Game & Watch has no visible eyes in his neutral animation, the loading screen, and the damage meter render when parrying (which temporarily lights up the selected character's eyes) makes Mr. Game & Watch glow where his eyes would be. The same applies to his Final Smash activation picture, which focuses on where his eyes would be, as with other characters.
    • While some of his moves cause him to resemble characters from the Game & Watch series with eyes, they are not affected by parrying.
  • Along with Samus and Dark Samus, Mr. Game & Watch is one of the few characters in Ultimate to lack voice-clips in the Sound Test, despite Duck Hunt and R.O.B. being included. This is probably because the game considers his various beeps as sound effects instead.
  • In spite of other languages having a translated word for the term "Mr.", no other language uses it in Ultimate for Mr. Game & Watch's name except for Russian, appropriately using "Г-н".
  • On the character selection screen, the icon in the Japanese version show Mr. Game & Watch's name within only one row, while in the English version it is shown with two rows. He shares this trait with Captain Falcon, Zero Suit Samus, Pokémon Trainer, Wii Fit Trainer, Rosalina & Luma, the Mii Fighters, Piranha Plant and Banjo & Kazooie.
  • Mr. Game & Watch's "transformation" into other Game & Watch characters are fully 2-D, unlike his regular model, although the manhole in his down tilt is still rendered in 3-D. This can be seen when under the effect of a Metal Box.
    • Strangely, during animations where Mr. Game & Watch opens his mouth without changing appearance, if he is Metal or Gold, the reflection texture on his head turns upside-down. This can be seen mainly during taunts and aerials.
  • Mr. Game & Watch's route in Classic Mode is vaguely similar to Pac-Man's, as both characters fight retro video-game characters from the NES era for opponents.
    • Coincidentally, they are chronologically the oldest fighters in Ultimate, with Mr. Game & Watch being older than Pac-Man by one month.
  • In the form of all Game & Watch series spirits, Mr. Game & Watch is one of the only characters to use their default costumes in a spirit battle present at the game's initial launch, the others being Yoshi, Bowser Jr., and R.O.B.
    • Mr. Game & Watch is also one of two of these characters to use his default costume in more than one spirit battle, the other being Bowser Jr., and the only one of those four to do so at launch.
    • Alongside Yoshi and Bowser Jr., Mr. Game & Watch is one of the few characters with a spirit battle where all of his alternate costumes appear.
  • As a consequence of not having visible eyes, Mr. Game & Watch is the only character with puppet fighters in World of Light that lack their signature red or purple eyes, simply using his model and various alternate costumes with no alterations.
    • Pac-Man, Samus, and Dark Samus also share this distinction, though it is only through the spirit battle previews, where they, along with Mr. Game & Watch, do not emit red-flashing eyes.
  • Mr. Game & Watch is one of few characters who have two moves that trigger Special Zoom, being Judge and Oil Panic.
  • Due to a programming oversight, the sweetspots of Mr. Game & Watch's down smash do not cause any hit effect to appear on aerial or downed targets. This is due to the effect being misspelled as "noamal" in the scripts.
  • In Mr. Game & Watch's showcase trailer in Ultimate, Mr. Game & Watch is seen using his down smash in his new Vermin design, which had a slightly different look (such as his eyes being more circular and large, his hair being more scattered than the original and the size of his mouth being more extended) compared to how it is seen in the final release.
  • When a character becomes a ball in Mr. Game & Watch's throws, they are considered a UI element instead of a part of the foreground, and as such will appear over Windy Hill Zone's grass.
  • Oddly, Mr. Game & Watch used to be unable to angle his shield directly forward as doing so caused the shield to reset to neutral position. This was fixed in a patch.
  • Mr. Game & Watch is one of the two Melee fighters to never appear in a CGI trailer in Ultimate, the other being Dr. Mario.

References

  1. ^ Oil Panic Resource
  2. ^ https://twitter.com/AllSourceGaming/status/1060056482664927232


v • d • e
Fighters in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate
Veterans Bayonetta · Bowser · Bowser Jr. · Captain Falcon · Cloud · Corrin · Dark Pit · Diddy Kong · Donkey Kong · Dr. Mario · Duck Hunt · Falco · Fox · Ganondorf · Greninja · Ice Climbers · Ike · Jigglypuff · King Dedede · Kirby · Link · Little Mac · Lucario · Lucas · Lucina · Luigi · Mario · Marth · Mega Man · Meta Knight · Mewtwo · Mii Fighter (Mii Brawler · Mii Gunner · Mii Swordfighter) · Mr. Game & Watch · Ness · Olimar · Pac-Man · Palutena · Peach · Pichu · Pikachu · Pit · Pokémon Trainer (Charizard · Ivysaur · Squirtle) · R.O.B. · Robin · Rosalina & Luma · Roy · Ryu · Samus · Sheik · Shulk · Snake · Sonic · Toon Link · Villager · Wario · Wii Fit Trainer · Wolf · Yoshi · Young Link · Zelda · Zero Suit Samus
Newcomers Banjo & Kazooie · Byleth · Chrom · Daisy · Dark Samus · Hero · Incineroar · Inkling · Isabelle · Joker · Kazuya · Ken · King K. Rool · Min Min · Piranha Plant · Pyra / Mythra  · Richter · Ridley · Sephiroth · Simon · Sora · Steve · Terry
v • d • e
Game & Watch (universe) Game & Watch universe
Fighter Mr. Game & Watch (SSBM · SSBB · SSB4 · SSBU)
Stages Flat Zone · Flat Zone 2 · Flat Zone X
Trophies, Stickers and Spirits Trophies (SSBM · SSBB · SSB4) · Stickers · Spirits
Music Flat Zone · Flat Zone 2
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